Los Angeles herald., 1891-10-25
TEN ACRES.
What They Will Yield in
Southern California.
Equal to One Hundred Acres
Elsewhere.
They Will Easily Produce Enough to
Support Family.
The Results of Actual Experience-De-
tailed Instructions How TO Accom-
plish That Result-Read
and Profit.


ern Californian has a valuable paper,
from which the following is taken:l
What I mean is that the av-
erage man and woman, who have to earn
their support by hard labor and eco
nomic habits, may go on to ten acres in
almost any part of this or other valleys
in Southern California and live as well
as the average farmer in other states
who works his sixty, eighty or a hun
dred acres. OF course, if the land is
new the partnership should also have
been of recent date, and the increase of
family healthily grow with the growth
| of the trees and vines of the farm.
| With these definitions, | can say that
l have practically solved for myself the
| problem of show to make ten acres
support family"
In the first place, find out by examin-
| ing the neighboring ranches what kinds
of trees and vines do best in your local
ity; for this country is not like the vast
country of Illinois and adjacent states,
where corn will grow almost equally as
we'll in any portion OF it. | would not
advise planting more than five acres to
one kind of fruit, where you have but
ten acres, because all fruits are liable to
have their "of years." and if the family
support depended entirely on one kind,
and that should fail for two consecutive
years, the family might be reduced to
quite Strengthened circumstances. Hav.
| ing decided on the varieties to plant,
make plan of your entire place, and
| bear in mind that you want to so plan
/ as to have rows as long as possible, so as
to avoid frequent tnrnings with horse
| and cultivators. With only ten acres
from which to support family from the
start, should plant my trees and vines
on the square plan rather than the
triangular or quincunx, so as to better
utilize the space between the trees, as l
shall hereafter show.
These preliminaries arranged, plow
deeply with four horses, using a sub
soiler behind the turning plow to loosen,
but not raise, the lower soil, and harrow
till all is as smooth as can be made.
| This must be done when the soil is in
! just the proper condition from rains or
! irrigation. The whole ten acres should
| be SO leveled that you can get irrigatiug
| water on all parts of it with little labor.
! Lay off half-acre near your barn. put
good bank around it, and SOW twenty
| pounds of clean alfalfa seed on it, and
thoroughly cover it with light harrow.
| This may seem to be good deal of seed
for half an acre, but you can't afford to
sow less as you are situated.
Ii walnuts are adapted to your place,
plant row OF soft-shells on all sides of
your ranch, thirty-fye feet apart, as
near the edge as you desire having
| fruiting tree. Or they may be used for
/ oil
| fer the pepper tree for wind
ed to your locality, the fig will
be, and may be substituted for the nut
| tree, putting them only twenty-five or
thirty feet apart. Plant the white Adri-
| attic or brown Smyrna. In one corner
of your ranch also put one or two acres
of walnuts or figs, putting the nut trees
forty feet apart and the fig trees thirty
| feet. AS the alfalfa will be a little slow
in getting a start. it will be the best the
! first year to SOW the spaces between the
nut and fig trees to barley, so you will
have some early feed for the horse and
COW. One good horse is ample after
your ground is first fitted to plant, and
the team for this work had better be
hired. Now plant the remainder of
your land to two or three varieties of
fruit trees, or fruit trees and one kind
OF vines. The apricot, fig, peach, petite
prune, Bartlett, Clap's favorite and
winter Nellis pears, orange, lemon and
muscat grape will ever be in good de-
mand; and with these to select from,
almost any ten acres in the valley
can be made to yield handsome in
come-say a thousand dollars year
net, after coming into full bearing-and
this is much more than the farms of the
United States average.
But, while these trees and vines are
coming into full bearing, the family
must in some way be clothed and fed.
To do this successfully, put the ground
between the rows of trees into the high
est state OF cultivation, and plant sweet
corn, potatoes, peas, beans, cabbages,
caulitlowers, tomatoes, melons, peanuts.
etc. With proper care it will not be
long before you have an abundance to
eat and sell. | am aware that there are
those who earnestly protest against
growing anything between the trees. if
the trees are to be kept in their best
condition. But l think it will he
found, on close examination that
these protesters are closely related to
that class of people who move their
barns when their manure piles get so
big around the doors that it is difficult
getting over them. There are thou-
sands of acres in the vicinity of
New York and other old cities that
have had every foot of ground occu-
pied by growing plants for the past
one hundred years, and this ground
is more productive today than ever be-
fore. Take as heavy and as frequent
crops as you choose from any lands, at
tending to a proper rotation of crons
and at the same time give it the proper
cultivation, and return to the soil a lit
tie more plant food than you take ont
in crops, and your land will increase in
fertility, and your trees will do better in
every way than by the usual treatment
ofthose who object to planting between
the trees. OF course, care must he
taken to plant nothing that will obsrnct
the light and heat of the sun. To ilIus-
trate: When ! began putting out one
and one-half acres of grape cuttings 7
| planted peanuts between the rows. and
in the fall ] sold the crop of peanuts for
over ninety dollars. But l got an extra
yield and an extra price. But il Won
| cut it down one-half it still makes a
good investment. When these vines
were two years old they yielded four
tons of grapes per acre the first cron
and the second crop, was largely suit.
able for raisins. The three.year-old
| vines, last year, yielded over six tons ner
| acre the first crop. and I know ~ ~.