The Nevada journal., 1861-02-08
CULTIvATING THE MOUNTAINS AND
E0OT HILLS.

cervlle is in great demand for orchards ant
vineyards, some of it commanding as higf
as fifty dollars an acre. A spirit for cult
waiting the mountain soil seems to have beer
kindled in that vicinity owing to the gene
rous yields that have followed the expert.
ments already attempted. 1t has been found
on trial that no better soil could be desired
for cultivating the grape than the foot hills
of California afford. The grape grown in
such localities, however inferior for the ia
bic, are pronounced by those most capable
of Judging far superior for wine. The i'm
preston that the foot hills are the best wine
districts is exciting ali attention to them
which promises fruitful results. We un-
derstand from several sources that consid-
erable rivalry exists in the lower parts OF
Nevada county in cHltivating the grape, and
that very large number of vines are being
and vicinity, and to a still lingering i'm
preston that the soil of the mountains will
not sustain continued cultivation for years
without An expense which the returns will
not justify, but little comparatively has
been done in the way of vine planting. A
few vines set out four or five years ago, all
of the Los Angeles variety, the tenderest of
all vines yet tried in this region, yield reg
ular and abundant crops and richly repay
oil In OH kot Io,
their cultivation. The vines are bitten
down considerably by the frosts of the
winter, and sometimes, as was the case last
year, the first fruit stems were cut down
and destroyed by the hard freeze in May
The vines however threw out other fruit
stems and new crop was produced, little
late in maturing, but quite fair in its yield.
The capacity of the vine to throw out a new
crop when the first fruit stems of the spring
are destroyed makes it most valuable to
cultivate in frosty districts. Fruit trees
rarely do this. A crop of peaches, plums
or apples once destroyed by the frost and
we are compelled to wait another year for
fruit.
The Los Angeles, or Mission grape, grows
without protection in this vicinity. More
hardy kinds would suffer less from the cold
and do better. As yet no other variety has
come into bearing to our knowledge, but
the young vines of the Black Hamburg,
Chasselas, Black Malvasia, and few other
kinds, seem to stand the winters well with
out the least protection.
A great many people entertain the idea
that the labor of cultivating the grape at
this altitude is too great to pay. A similar
opinion relative to the region north of the
Ohio river was once prevalent among the
people. Yet the vine is now successfully
cultivated in nearly all parts of the free
States. Longworth has demonstrated that
wine growing may be made profitable in
country formerly thought to be unfavorable,
and the returns of the census takers show
that the grape is year by year travelling
northward and being acclimated. The same
northward tendency of the vine has been
seen in the old world At the time of the
irruption of TIE Goths the vine was not
known in Germany. 1t was cultivated only
in the countries tempered by the Meaiter-
ranean. Now the grape is grown in regions
where the vine has to be covered with earth
several feet in winter to protect it from
. tl,a Al, 4. 1. I
of the Caspian sea, where the long, dry
summers perfect the grape as completely as
in the south of Spain.
Certainly the mountains of California,
even at the altitude of two thousand five |
hundred feet above the sea, labor under no
such disadvantages as those we have men
toned. 1t would be no great venture to |
say that grape raising will pay better in
this vicinity according to the labor expen-
dcd upon it, than in half the vine growing
of the world, and that the time |
will soon come when it will be so acknowl- |
edged.
If the Los Angeles variety of grape pro-
duces here, at four years from the cutting,
fifteen pounds to the vine on an average, as |
we have seen, who will say that grape
growing is not profitable? And if other
kinds will do better, as we are almost sure
they will, it is not too much to affirm that |
the citizens of Nevada ought not to be far
behind their brethren in other parts of the
State in making productive the foot hills
and mountains.