Sullivan republican. [volume] (Laporte, Pa.) 1883-1896, 1890-01-31
FIG CULTURE.
RAISING THIS POPULAR FRUIT
IN THE FAR EAST.
Smyrna the Worlds Great Fig Mar
ket-A California Experiment
A Singular Property
of Wild Figs.

popular of dried fruits. From the heart
of the town a railway starts, running
south to Ephesus and eastward to
Sarakeui, and the traffic of the line de-
pends largely on the fruit harvest. In
Smyrna itself is the great market for the
distribution of the figs to all parts of the
world, and in harbor here may be seen
a large fleet of steamers lying moored
stern on to the quays, and porters, car
riers, and humel busy loading them in
great wooden cases. 1t is by this rail
way that you make your way into the fig
district. The tract is comparatively
small, when it is remembered chat its
produce may be found all over the world.
1t is, in fact, actually small-a valley of
some fifty miles skirting the northern
bank of the Meander, and with a width
at its widest of scarcely more than five
miles. Twenty years ago not half this
area was under cultivation.
The soil of this tract is very deep, and
has the property of retaining moisture, so
necessary for the crop. The popularity
is of special Importance, as in cases of
drought the fig-tree does not generally
show at the time signs of dropping. The
leaves retain their strength and color. 1t
is only afterward, when the fruit should
have reached maturity, that its stunted
size and dimished yield show the effects
of the check. Indeed, it is this quality
of the soil that makes the valley of the
Meander the great centre of the fig-crop.
Experiments have been tried by trans.
planting the trees to raise crop in the
neighboring valleys, but they never have
been successful. Some years ago Mr..
West discovered in California tract of
soil which he believed to be almost iden-
tical. The climate also was similar Mr.
West took back with him some 800 roots.
These fig-trees have done well. They
have made good growth and yielded fair
crops, but sufficient time has
not yet elapsed for the tree to
reach such maturity as should test
the value of its fruit for preserv-
ing. 1t is only when the trees are from
five to seven years old that they begin to
60
but once that age is attained, the tree
win yield its annual crop for sixty or
seventy, or, with careful pruning, for
eighty years. The fruit does not all re-
semble the ordinary black eating fig. 1t
is short, pulpy fruit. A large one
would weigh quite four ounces. The color
is bright yellow green, but when you
cut into it the flesh is white, with cen
tire of dark red. The taste of these figs
is poor and rather faint, but the pulp
exudes an abundance of amber -colore
juice; so that they seem with the slight
est pressure almost to drip with honey.
Their promise to the taste is more than
their performance. We know how beauti-
full cherry orchard, or a garden wall
covered with peach.trees, can look in the
early weeks of mild spring. The fig
tree differs from almost all fruit
trees in this respect, that it
seems to bear no flowers. Of
course it does fower-if it did not it
could bear no fruit-but it flowers invis-
IDLY. In fact the flower is concealed in
what ultimately becomes the fruit. If you
cut open fig when it has attained little
more than third of its full size the flow
ers will be seen in full development, and
is at this stage that, if the stamens are
perfect, fertilization takes place, and the
fruit swells and ripens.
Walking through fig garden in the
Adm district n the month of June, you
will see strange and almost incompre-
hensible operation being carried on. The
trees are by this time covered with fruit,
though the figs are less than half the size
to which thev subsequently attain. The
boughs which bear them are often not
more than a few feet from tie ground.
One of the peasants IL the garden takes
basket filed with small green figs
strung loosely on pieces of cord. Some
of these cords will have only couple of
figs, and some as many as six. The work
man filings the cords up into the branches,
on the twigs of which they are caught,
50 that every tree Shall be adorned with
one of these singular necklaces. 1t is
hard to guess their purpose. These
strung figs are wild fruit, bitter in taste,
and quite useless as food, but they have
this singular property, that they arrest
e H. o%l, g - T..