52 Report of State Board of Horticulture. 



Coimty for twenty-eight years and never suffered an injury from 

 spring or fall frosts during that period until this "freak" year, 

 1908, when a frost occurred that killed the foliage on the vines on 

 September 25, with the result that many late varieties that had 

 not ripened were a loss. The earliest fall frost that ever before 

 occurred during the twenty-eight years was on October 25, 1905. 

 All varieties being then ripe, no loss was sustained. 



JACKSON COUNTY. 



Jackson County is the largest county in the Eogue Kiver Valley. 

 The Rogue River Valley in this county has a width of about sixteen 

 miles, an^l is twenty to twenty-five miles long. The lands in this 

 expanse of valley are a rich alluvial deposit that in early days was 

 devoted to farm products. T\Tieat, when the soil was new, yielded 

 from forty to fifty bushels to the acre ; corn, forty to sixty bushels. 



The adaptability of this rich valley to the growth of all kinds of 

 horticultural products has made the land of this valley too valuable 

 for growing farm products, hence at present but little farming is 

 done. Year by year the planting of orchards is increasing, and a few- 

 years more will see this valley a vast orchard of apples, pears and 

 peaches. Today there are about twenty-five thousand acres planted 

 in apples, twelve thousand acres in pears, and six thousand acres 

 in peaches in Jackson County. Medford, a thriving city of 4^000 

 population, is the center of the apple and pear industry, on the 

 main line of the Southern Pacific Railroad for shipping facilities. 

 In all directions from Medford are apple and pear orchards, varying 

 in s'ze from ten to four hundred acres. 



Ashland, twelve miles southeast of Medford. on the Southern 

 Pacific, with a population of 5,000, is located on the edge of the 

 valley at the beginning of the Siskiyou Range, on Ashland Creek. 

 While many apple and pear orchards are in the vicinity of the city, 

 as a peach-growing section it is the largest in the district. The 

 foothills around Ashland are all in peach orchards and the anmui! 

 shipments of peaches from this city run into the thousands. 



Jacksonville, the county seat of Jackson County, is four miles 

 west of Medford at the beginning of the foothills. Fine apple, pear 

 and peach lands adjoin the town, and the foothills are the very best 

 for growing all kinds of European grapes. 



Whatever may have been said of Josephine County as a grape- 

 growing district can in truth be said of Jackson County. Jackson 

 and Josephine Counties are both in the Rogue River Valley; climate 

 and soil conditions are identical. The winters are mild; snow rarely 

 falls in the valley. It is an "unusual winter" that the thermometer 

 goes as low as 18 degrees above zero. The orchardist and the 

 farmer does his plowing, planting and seeding: in tne Rogue River 

 A'^alley during the winter months ; rarely does freezing weather occur. 

 The Rogue River Valley is rightly called the "Italy of America." 



