THe JOURNAL 



OF 



LIBRARY 



MEW YORK 



()Tank;al 



GARDEN. 



T'fie department of Agriculture. 



Vol. VI. Part 12. 



10th Deeember, 1908. 



c 



FIFTH PROGRESS REPORT OX VITICULTURE 

 m EUROPE. 



{Continued from page 695.) 

 F. de Castella, Government \ iticulturist. 



La Bioja and Aragon. 



South-west of Xavarra, across the river Ebro lies the distrirt known 

 as La Rioja. It is not a legislative or administrational subdivision, but 

 a region which from an agricultural, and more especially a viticultural 

 stand-point, has a distinctive character of its own. It is further sub- 

 divided into Rioja Aha ; on the right bank of the Ebro, west of 

 Logrono; Rioja Baja on the right bank of the same river east of Logrono; 

 and Rioja Alavesa on the opposite bank and forming part of the pro- 

 vince of Alava in the Basque country. The two first-named subdivisions 

 constitute the riverside portion of the province of Logrono in Old Castille. 

 It is onlv in this milder part that vines are much grown, for the southern 

 half of the province is mountainous, rising in places to an altitude of 

 7,500 feet above sea level. 



La Rioja is usually bracketed with the adjoining region (ancient 

 kingdom) of Aragon in official publications ; together they make up a 

 very important group of viticultural districts which may be best described 

 as that of the upper Ebro valley. This region in 1889 possessed no less 

 than 547,778 acres under vines which yielded in that year the enormous 

 quantitv of 88,628.760 gallons of wine or nearly one-seventh of the total 

 wine yield of Spain. 



In 1906 this area had fallen, according to official statistics, to 

 400,000 acres yielding only 35.302,388 gallons of wine, this large re- 

 duction in vield being brought al;out by the ravages of phylloxera which 

 found its way into La Rioja in 1890 and more recently into Aragon 

 Want of time rendered it impossible for me to study viticultural problems 

 in Aragon ; besides, reconstitution is not yet sufficientlv advanced for 

 it to constitute an important field for inquiry. It is a region which 



1412.5. Z 



