Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1873-10-24
Farming in California.

Farming in California.
The farmer in this state is u per.
son of uncommon resources and in.
genuity. l think he uses his brains
more than our eastern farmers.
do not mean to say that he lives
better, for he does not. His house
is often shabby, even though he be
a man of wealth, and his table is
not unfrequently without milk; he
buys his butter with his canned
vegetables in San Francisco, and
bread and mutton are the chief part
of his living, both being universally
good here. But in managing his
land he displays great enterprise,
and knows how to fit his efforts to
the climate and soil. Thus, in the
tule lands, when they were first
drained, he finds it impossible to
work the soil with cattle or horses;
but this does not prevent him from
putting in a crop, for after burning
off the tules, which are tall reeds,
and the high grasses, he sows his
hundreds of acres with coffee mill
wheat sower, and coolly turns a
flock of sheep on the ground, driv-
ing them compactly and slowly over
it, with the help of dogs to keep the
TANKS of his flock from scattering;
and wheat thus "sheeped in," as
they call it, has borne sixty bushels
per acre. Nor is this all. Unless
he depends upon a volunteer crop
the next year, he must pillow the
ground. 1t is still, however, com
monty too light to bear up horses,
and so he shoes these animals with
stout wooden sabots, eleven inches
long by eight broad, and thus they
can walk at leisure and drag the
gang-plow after them.
The gathering of the wheat crop
goes on on all the valley lands with
headers, and you will find on all the
farms in the Sacramento Valley the
best labor-saving machinery en-
ployed, and human labor, which is
always the most costly, put to its
best and most profitable uses. They
talk here Of steam plows and steam
wagons for common roads, and
have no doubt the steam-plow will
be first practically and generally
used, SO far as the United States
are concerned, in these California
valleys, where l have seen burrows
two miles long, and ten eight horse
teams following each other.
Withal, they are somewhat ruth.
less in their pursuit of a wheat crop
You may see farmer who plows
hundreds of acres, but he will have
his wheat growing up to the edge
of his veranda. If he keeps a veg.
etable garden, he has performed Il
heroic act Of selfdenial, and as for
flowers, they must grow among the
wheat or nowhere. Moreover, while
he has great ingenuity in his meth.
DDS, the farmer of the Sacramento
plain has but little originality in
his planting. He raises wheat and
barley. He might raise q dozen, a
score, Of other products, many more
profitable, and all obliging him to
cultivate less ground, but it is only
here and there you meet with ono
who appreciates the remarkable ca.
liabilities Of the soil and climate
Near Tehama some Chinese have
in the last two years grown large
crops of peanuts, and have, l am
told, realized handsome profits from
nut which will be popular in
America, / suppose, as long as there
is pit and a gallery in theatre;
but the peanut makes a valuable
oil, and as it produces enormously
here, it will some day be raised fol
this purpose, as well as for the ben.
eft of old women who keep fruit.
stands Oh the street corners. 1,
would not be surprising if the Chi,
nesc, who continue to come over to
California in great numbers, should
yet show the farmers here what can
be done on small farms by patien,
and thorough culture. AS yet they
confine their culture of land mainly
to vegetable gardens.
TO the farmer the valley and
foot-hill slands of the Sacramento
will be the most attractive, and
there are still here thousands OF
acres in the hands of the govern
ment and the railroad company to
be obtained so cheaply that, wheth
er for crops or grazing, it will be
some time before the mountainous
lands and the pretty valleys they
contain north of Redding, the pres
ent terminus Of the railroad, will
attract settlers. But for the travel
er the region north of Redding tc
the state line offers uncommon at
tractions.-Charles Nordhof, IN
Horpe''s Magazine for NovemJer.