State Agricultural Society. 7 



by the exhibitors that its production in quantity at the prices it com- 

 mands may be made very satisfactorily profitable. 



The cultivation of the castor bean and the manufacture of the oil is 

 becoming a permanent and remunerative business in some portions of the 

 State; Yuba County alone having grown the last year over six hundred 

 thousand pounds oi beans, while the product of the State was over 

 seven hundred thousand pounds. This, at four cents a pound to the pro- 

 ducers, paid them twenty-eight thousand dollars. There is no reason 

 why we should not extend this business and become large exporters 

 of the oil, as nearly all portions of the State are equally well adapted to 

 raising the bean. 



The cultivation and preparation of chickory has also been successfully 

 carried on in Yolo County for a number of years past, by a company of 

 Germans, and is growing into a business of no little importance. The 

 product of the firm the last year was one hundred and thirty-five tons, 

 valued at twenty thousand dollars. Other counties are also engaging in 

 the business to some extent — five thousand dollars' worth having been 

 grown and prepared in San Joaquin the past season. The soil of all our 

 river bottoms of a sandy loam is well adapted to this product, and it can 

 therefore be extended almost without limit, as its demand for commerce 

 is coequal with that of coffee, with which and as a substitute for which 

 it is used. 



English mustard is being produced in some of the southern counties 

 quite extensively, Monterey alone having produced the last year nearly 

 thirteen thousand bushels, valued at over twenty thousand dollars, while 

 in Santa Barbara there was gathered forty thousand dollars worth of 

 wild mustard seed, and in otber counties a considerable quantity, swell- 

 ing the value of the product of the latter variety alone in the State to 

 the sum of sixty thousand dollars. 



The value of the broomcorn crop for eighteen hundred and seventy, 

 produced principally in the Counties of Yuba, Sutter, and Amador was 

 over forty-five thousand dollars. 



FRUITS. 



As to the production of fruits and nuts, both of the temperate and 

 tropical climates, there is probably no other equal area of the earth's 

 surface, embraced in a single body or laying together, that can excel or 

 equal our State in the number of kinds or general good qualities of the 

 varieties produced. A careful conrparison of the apple grown in the 

 elevated foothills of our State with the same varieties exhibited at our 

 last State Fair from the States east of the Rocky Mountains, ranging 

 from Massachusetts to Kansas, proved most conclusively that for general 

 good qualities of flavor and keeping, our fruit is equal to the best, 

 and in size, form, and color, and general inviting appearance, is far 

 superior to any. While the apples from all the other States show the 

 effects of the ravages of insects more or less and in one way or another, 

 ours are perfectly free from all damage or imperfections caused by these 

 fruit pests. The extremes of our climate, from the warm valleys of the 

 coast foothills to the high altitudes of the Sierras at which apples are 

 cultivated successfully, are so great that with a little care in selecting 

 varieties, and in preparations for keeping this most valuable of fruits, we 

 may have our markets supplied with fresh apples the year round. Our 

 peacbes, plums, prunes, figs, apricots, nectarines, cherries, strawberries, 

 blackberries, raspberries, and gooseberries are universally admired and 



