Year: 1859




cramento and San Joaquin rivers, they fail
to afford sufficient pasturage for the herds of
cattle that seek them. This assertion we
base upon the testimony Of contemporaries,
upon that of travellers, and upon circum-
stances which have come under our own
observation. This failure is attributed by
some to the destruc tive visitation of grass
hoppers and the increased quantity of stock,
beth of which have doubtless had their in
faencej bat the paramount cause, in our
opinion, is to be found in the fact that tee
land mentioned has been too long fed upon
without the grass Seing allowed chance
for recuperation. 1t has been gnawed down,
year after year, by annually increasing herds
which have been allowed to roam over it at
will, preventing it from bearing seed and
gradually robbing tire ola roots of vitality,
antil at last the growth has become meager
and insufficient, not endaring well beyond
the season of moist&re. This is probably
true Of other pasture lands in California,
even as far outh as San Bernardino, and
ought to attract early attention with a view
to the discovery of remedy. The amount
of stock in the State has this year been
swelled By at least one hundred thousand
head of cattle, and we know not how many
horses, mules and sheep. All these mouths
must be as sareiy provided for as though
they belonged to human beings. If the
heretofore boun0ful plains yield but stinted
supplies their fertility must be restored or
supplies sought elsewhere.


AS the easiest expedent, numerous herds
of stock have been driven from the great
valleys named to the linked sisterhood of
small valleys which lie between the eastern
and western SUBMITS of the Sierra Nevada
forming a broken plateau that extends the
whole length of the State, or on to the
nearer fats which lie along the head waters
of the various streams flowing westward.
A good share of the emigrant stock has re-
manned till now on these mountain pastures.
while some of it came no farther than the
valleys of Western Utah. The relief thus
afforded to the depleted pasture lands of our
great valleys, can be but temporary. Much
of the summit and eastern slope pasture
land will soon be cultivated to supply fruit
and vegetables to the new communities of
Western Utah, and the remainder will be
chiefly fenced for hay crops. If the expert
ment of sowing the best of our now useless
hill-sides with grass, clover or alfalfa is ever
successfully made, the difficulty we are dis
cussing will be readily overcome. Mean
while, as we depend so much for grazing
upon the regions named at the beginning of
these remarks, they should be recuperated
by such means as experience teaches are the
most efficient. There should be more land
fenced and allowed to seed itself Some
should be ploughed and cropped, and then
seeded to domestic grasses, which will prove
far superior to the wild growths for hay or
pasture. In this way the farmers and stock
ranchers of the lower country can retrieve
much land now comparatively worthless,
and feed upon smaller area a large num-
ber of cattle. Fencing alone would protect
great deal of fine pasturage from decay,
and utilize for other purposes thousands of
acres which are now abandoned to widely
scattered herds. These ideas are not ad-
yanced as novel or infallibe, but as sugges-
tions meant to be useful if only in attract
ing the attention of better informed or more
competent persons.