The discovery of gold in 1848 and the consequent increase in population checked the cattle industry, for bread as well as meat was wanted by the new settlers. In 1862-64 a fearful drought, such as sometimes comes to subtropical countries, gave a still greater check, for it destroyed thousands of cattle. Then sheep-raising assumed great importance until the flocks threatened destruction both to the forests and to the grasslands where the sheep nibbled off the seedlings and grasses to the very roots. In the drier parts of Cal ifornia and among the mountains cattle and sheep are still the main stay of many of the people, but elsewhere they are much less impor tant than in better watered States like Wisconsin.
(2) The Wheat-raising Stage.—After the discovery of gold, a second stage of agriculture began in California. Wheat became the staple crop, just as in the subtropical regions of Turkey. The size of the ranches accordingly decreased, while the population increased. Wheat-raising, to be sure;requires large farms, but not nearly so large as does cattle raising. In 1850 the average ranch contained about 4500 acres, and some comprised several hundred thousand acres. Ten years later the average farm was only one-tenth as large. Now the size has fallen to about 300 acres and is still declining rapidly. Never theless some farms are still so enormous that in the morning ten or twenty plows start from the barns and take all day to make a complete trip across the field and back.
The level nature of the great interior valley and the size of the wheat farms has led to the introduction of remarkable machinery. Great gangplows drawn by steam engines or by twenty or thirty horses plow a dozen or more furrows at a time. Equally wonderful harvesting machines are used. Drawn by twenty-five or thirty horses or propelled by gasoline engines they cut, thresh, and sack the standing grain in one operation at the rate of two bushels a min ute. Such machinery can be used only in regions where the harvest ing season is dry and sunny as in subtropical California, for only the thoroughly dry kernels can be threshed while the grain is being cut. One man's work with modern machinery in California harvests as much grain as the work of twenty or thirty in Turkey. Since 1880 when California harvested 54,000,000 bushels of wheat the production has fallen off, but this is partially compensated by a great amount of barley. Much land which cannot be irrigated will always be better
for grain than for anything else.
(3) The Fruit-raising Stage.—So long as California devoted itself largely to raising cattle and cereals the chief advantage of its farmers over those of Turkey lay in greater energy and skill. During the last forty years, however, the State has reaped another great advan tage from the abundance of the water in its mountains. To-day California depends for a large part of its wealth upon irrigation. The irrigated farms are generally of small size and are devoted chiefly to fruit, with some vegetables. .With the possible exception of parts of Italy and Spain there is no part of the world where fruit is more abundant. The beautiful plum orchards of such places as Santa Clara County furnish more prunes than any similar areas in the world. Equally remarkable are the hundreds of square miles of green vineyards in Fresno County and elsewhere. The California grape is known everywhere, and is converted into famous raisins, and grape juice. A still more wonderful scene is the orange groves of the south, especially in the valley from San Bernardino to Los Angeles. Literally millions of trees with their polished leaves and symmetrical round shape are so loaded with yellow oranges that one scarcely can them to be natural. For the high quality and great abun dance of its fruit California is indebted not only to irrigation, but to the dry sunny weather in the summer and fall. How important this is may be judged from a comparison with Florida. Although that State raises a third as many oranges as California and a far larger supply of grape fruit, it raises less than 1 per cent as many grapes, apples, pears, peaches, plums, and other orchard fruits.
The necessity of exercising great care in order to sell their fruit in the distant markets of the East has led the fruit growers to com bine their interests. Practically every community has a co-operative packing house where fruit is cleaned, sorted, and packed, and from which it is shipped to meet the demands of the market. In the hands of a people who are full of ambition and energy the great natural resources of California together with such co-operative enterprises have made the State the most prosperous and progressive of all sub tropical countries.