North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Mark Dorogi" <mddorogi@comcast.net>]

I’ve been bagging apples using sandwich bags and noticed a few things.  

 

I bought 900 bags at Meijer, since they were cheap (about $6.50 per 300 count box) but the seals just don’t snap shut well.  After one day, some had come off, and the seal has opened up on many others.

 

So I bought some at Kroger and although they are slightly more expensive, they have deeper grooves on the seal and they close very securely and tightly.  Last year I used these Kroger bags and they stayed on all year.  I’m surprised that there’s such a difference in the bags.

 

It takes a while to prepare these baggies for use.  I cut off the lower two corners with a sharp knife (10 to 15 bags at a time) and them remove the excess flap near the seal with scissors.

 

After installing 200 of these baggies, I noticed an obvious thing: there is no need to remove the flap for long stem apple varieties. Most of my trees have pretty long stems, so I can save some work by skipping that step. I do have a couple short stem varieties though that will require that extra step.

 

 

Mark

SE Michigan