who know Canada merely as the name of an 

 expansive country existing to the north of them 

 have the products of the Dominion on their 

 dinner tables. The virgin woods of Canada 

 provide the arboreal decorations peculiarly 

 associated with the day. 



The supplying of turkeys and other poultry 

 to the United States market has developed in 

 Canada into a Christmas industry of some 

 proportions. For years the Maritime Provinces 

 have supplied Boston, New York and other 

 large centres. This industry has become an 

 important one in the Western Provinces, and 

 Alberta especially sends large supplies at Christ- 

 mas-time down across the border. The Egg and 

 Poultry branch of the Alberta Department of 

 Agriculture last year marketed in all 40,000 

 pounds of turkeys, 20,000 pounds of which 

 went to the markets of Minneapolis and St. 

 Paul. 



Fat Turkeys and Christmas Trees 



These turkeys were raised in all parts of the 

 province and other large supplies were marketed 

 individually. The Brooks irrigated district in 

 Southern Alberta, which has made a name for 

 itself in such a wide diversity of agricultuial 

 products, killed 43,000 pounds of turkeys at 

 eight centres last year and marketed them co- 

 operatively, the larger portion going to the 

 United States. The same industry has been 

 found profitable as far north as the Grande 

 Prairie region of the Peace River country, and a 

 farmer in that section last December shipped 

 more than 70,000 pounds of turkeys, whilst 

 shipments of the Grain Growers'-Cooperative 

 Association from the same country exceeded 

 this. 



The Christmas-tree industry of Canada is a 

 comparatively insignificant one judged from the 

 standpoint of revenue but sentimentally, for 

 a brief period each year, it is one of transcendent 

 importance. The lavish exploitation and de- 

 pletion of United States forests for economic 

 purposes has left scant growth for festive 

 occasions and in the demand for the little spruce 

 at Christmas time the vast Canadian forests 

 are called upon for substantial supplies. 



For weeks before Christmas the woodsmen 

 have been in the woods selecting the little trees 

 which are to gladden many homes that will 

 never know or suspect their origin. Fanners in 

 certain sections of the Dominion, too, have had 

 sufficient foresight and energy to plant their 

 rough and stoney lands to this crop and annually 

 harvest a small but profitable yield of Christmas 

 trees. 



In the last fiscal year the United States 

 purchased trees from Canada to the extent of 

 83,666, the bulk of which was undoubtedly 

 made up of Christmas shrubbery. 



Holly and Hothouse Blooms 



Another forest production which is peculiarly 

 associated with the Christmas season is holly. 

 Holly in Canada is almost exclusively confined 

 to the Pacific coast province of British Columbia 

 and residents of that province are just beginning 

 to realize what a big demand there is for the 

 shrub once it is known it can be obtained. The 

 market is expanding so largely that the industry 

 is beginning to develop into a substantial one. 

 Ranchers are coming in certain sections to 

 engage extensively in its production, and, accord- 

 ing to one of these, eight hundred dollars an acre 

 is a fair average income to be secured from holly- 

 growing. 



In the popular conception of the northern 

 winter, Canada is the last place to which one 

 would come for flowers at the Christmas season, 

 and it should banish some hardened miscon- 

 ceptions ol the Dominion's winter clime to learn 

 that Alberta, in the dead of winter, sends out a 

 profusion of bloossms to decorate the homes of 

 cities of the United States. In the little city 

 of Medicine Hat is a nursery known as "The 

 Rosery" which all the year round, and especially 

 at Christmas-time, distributes thousands of the 

 most delicate blooms over the continent, not a 

 few crossing the border and going to United 

 States cities. 



A Satisfactory Year 



The Dominion of Canada, arriving at the termination 

 of the year 1922, has every reason to look back over the past 

 twelve months with a sense of intense satisfaction and to 

 face the prospect of the next twelve months in a spirit of 

 faith and optimism. The past year has seen the last 

 struggle in the emerging from the period of post-war 

 depression and the taking of the first lengthy stride in the 

 new and more prosperous way. This is not a mere ventur- 

 ing of opinion, but an existing state of affairs which will 

 only be appreciated when the cojd, convincing figures of 

 production are published and enjoyed in retrospect. In 

 practically every phase of her national activity Canada 

 has, in 1922. seen the dawn of brighter conditions evi- 

 denced in enhanced output. 



The cost of living has substantially declined. The 

 index of wholesale prices is lower than it has been for years. 

 The average cost of the weekly family budget is only 

 $10.28 as against $11.82 in 1921 and $15.95 in 1920. It 

 has still some way to go before reaching the $7.83 of 1914, 

 but the tendency is rapidly in the right direction. 



Unemployment has practically disappeared. In fact, 

 as a consequence of the draining of the East by the West 

 for harvest workers, an artificial labor shortage was 

 created temporarily, certain trades, notably building, 

 being acutely affected. 



Perhaps nothing so illustrates Canada's rapid recovery 

 as the retrieval of the Canadian dollar, which, quoted at a 

 discount of 19 per cent at the end of 1920, is at a slight 

 premium at the end of 1922. 



Canada's Trade Gratifying 



Canada's trade is gratifying from many view points 

 and substantially increasing. Since the war the Dominion 

 has risen from ninth to fourth place among the great 

 exporting nations of the world, sending her goods to forty- 

 four countries, and leading all countries in the per capita 

 volume of exported goods. On the operation of the first 



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