The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1850-1873, 1872-09-06
Agriculture In California.

Agriculture in California.
In California rains begin late In o.
tober. The grass is green all winter;
blowing begins on the first of Decem-
Der; wheat, barley, oats and other
crops are s0wed as soon rs the lane
can be made fit; and sowing and plant
ing are continued as late Is March.
Thus the husbandman has three or
four months to put in bis crops. Trees
are also trahsplanted in this season
South of San Francisco, and In the
great San Joaquin Valley, froetis rare
~ known, roses bloom all the winter
through, the flower garded Is constant
ly full of flowers, and many shade
trees, like the acaciss, the pepper-tree,
and the Ive-oaks, Keep their foliage
green the year round. Corn is planted
from March TO May, and harvested As
late as December. In the southern
counties, and In the San joaquin VAL
ley especially, many farmers take two
crops from the same field-wheat or
barley for the fist, and corn for the
second and have seen fields which
vie ded, i'm good season, 90 bushels of
corn for the second crop. Wheat and
barley are commonly sown for hay,
and cut before the heads fill, in April
or May. Where this is done it is usual
to plant corn on the same field. The
harvest season for wheat, harley, aud
oats is in the latter part of May and
in June
After the middle of April the rains
cease, and the whole harvest season is
absolutely without rain. Thus the
farmer is not hurried, and the harvest
proceeds with none of that haste and
anxiety about the weather which trOu-
BILE the Eastern farmer. The small
grains are usually gathered by a ma
chine called "header," which clips
oil the heads of the grain stalk. Wheat
oats and barley are threshed on the
field, put into bags, and left either on
the fed or along the railroad, for
weeks often, in the open air, and until
the crop is sold and shipped. The
grain does not sweat, nor is it liable to
injury from this exposure. Hay, too,
Is baled or stacked on the field, and
left there until it is wanted. Potatoes
are often left in the ground after they
fit for digging Thus it is evident the
farmer has, in the long, dry Caiilornia
summer, an immense advantage oyer
his Eastern competitor. He needs
fewer hands, he is not hurried, and he
requires no costly granaries or barns to
contain the products of his fields.
Does he need to put away much food
for bis cattle. A quarter OF an acre OF
beets, replanted as they are used, will
support COW during the whole year.
Work horses receive barley aud hay
but sheep are never fed market cattle
fatten in the pastures, and horses not
al work get no food except what they
pick up in the fields, i'm winter as wei
as summer. The alfalfa, or Gillian
clover, which is now beginning to be
largely sown, does well TO feed to pigs
to cows, and even to pillow horses, and
bears enormous crops. On low GROUND
or where il can be irrigated, as much a.
twenty tons have been taken from al
acre; it is not cut from December tx
April, but yields from six to eight cut
tings in the year. Cattle and horses
are more easily kept in good condition
i'm California than elsewhere in thu
United States, and the farmer needs NJ
such substantial stable as in the Eas
tern states
Fruit trees bear much earlier thar
10 the East. The peach bears a peel
in the second year from planting tn,
pit (; the apple gives a crop at fiy,
years, and begin to bear at three; tn,
curculio is unknown; and such per
ishable fruits as plums and cherries
keep far longer than with us. / bav,
eaten cherries and Strawberries i'm Col
oradO which had been brought from
! Sacramento-a four days journey
and they were in perfect order. Thu
growth of fruit and other trees is extra
ordinary. The eucalyptus, fine Aus
tralia evergreen shade tree, has mad,
twenty feet i'm a year have seen Ou'
eight years from a small cutting which
was seventy-five feet high and two an,
half feet in diameter at the basel
J the apricot becomes almost forest tre
i'm size and in the southern parts O
the State it is the custom to max,
fences of sticks of willow, sycamore, o
cotton wood, cut to the length of eigh
feet, anu stuck into the ground in DE
cember. These strike root at once
and grow SO rapidly that i'm the secOn,
wear the farmer cuts his fire wood from
: TIE living fences.
Moreover, the variety of fruits cult
waited in the farmer's orchard, especial
ly in Southern California, is much great
er than with us. 1 have seen, com
monty in orchards, the apple, pear
peach, cherry, ounce, plum, nectarine
pomegranite-a most lovely tree o
tall shrub when in bloom; the fig
which bears two crops a year, the or
ange, lemon, almond, olive; Englis
walnut, and apricot; and you may ca
strawberries, wherever care is bestow
ed upon them in every month Of tn
year. Fruit trees are all free from dis
ease, though the pear-slug begins to b
troublesome in some places; and th
finest varieties of fruit known in tb
East grow freely here.-Hdfper'S Mag
dzine.