6 



THE IRRIGATION AGE 



manure only. This manure is piled 

 several feet high and two feet wide. It 

 is turned three times before being used. 

 About ten tons per acre is put on the 

 vines. This treatment causes the vines 

 to yield a great crop. 



Los Angeles Times. 



Frosts in Italy. The following dates 

 of disastrous freezes among the orange 

 groves of " sunny Italy " are given by an 

 Italian journal. In 1789, 1794, 1811, 

 1820, 1829, 1837 and 1854. It is alleged 

 that the best groves now to be found in 

 the Rivera region are those which grew 

 from the roots of the frozen trees of 

 1820.. 



French Import Apples. France pro- 

 duces enormous quantities of apples yet 

 imports large amounts each year. For 

 example: The crop of 1893 was 8,576, 

 645,517 pounds, and the imports were 

 10.445,802 pounds. In 1894 the imports 

 rose to 13,716,083 pounds, according to 

 Consul General Mors at Paris. 



Wheat Consumption. Five bushels 

 of wheat per capita, are regarded by the 

 best statisticans, as about the amount of 

 that cereal consumed annually in the 

 United States. Our population now is 

 about 70,000,000, hence a wheat crop of 

 350,000,000 to 400,000,000 bushels is 

 required for home consumption each 

 year. ^ 



Dried Fruits are alleged to be gaining 

 much favor as an article of diet through- 

 out the Eastern States, and some of the 

 grocery papers predict quite a boom in 

 such goods in the near future. 



Successful fruit culture may be de- 

 scribed in four words according to Prof. 

 Bailey: " Till, feed, prune, spray.' 1 This 

 however, is but half the battle. The 

 marketing comes next, and is really the 

 feature of the industry. If four words 

 could point to entire success in market- 

 ing fruits they w r ould probably be these; 

 " Cull mercilessly, pack carefully." 



An Object Lesson to fruit growers is 

 given in the following statement of Mr. 

 G. A. Cochrane, of Massachusetts, a 

 dealer in apples. He alleged that of fully 



fifty growers from whom he received 

 fruit for export only three culled it 

 closely, and the result was that the fruit 

 of these three careful packers brought 

 twice as much per barrel as the rest. 



Some Good Springs are found in Tex- 

 as. A bulletin from the experiment 

 station at College Station, Brazos County 

 mentions the fact that the water from 

 Lysle Springs has been used for 20 years 

 to irrigate 3000 acres of land. The flow 

 averages about 7,000 cubic feet per 

 minute. 



The Deepest Well in Texas is 3,300 

 feet, and the temperature of the water is 

 142 degrees, according to bulletin 35 

 from the Texas Experiment Station. 



An Ohio Beet Sugar Factory. Steps 

 are being taken by Joseph S. McKell 

 and other capitalists of Chillicothe, Ohio, 

 for the organization of a company to 

 operate a factory to manufacture beet 

 sugar. Emmitt's old distillery, a mam- 

 moth plant which has stood idle for 

 fifteen years, will be fitted up as a fact- 

 ory, if the deal goes through. At a 

 meeting of the Board of Trade much 

 interest was manifested in the propos- 

 ition. 



Tariff and Cattle It is claimed that 

 the present tariff law has had the effect 

 to lower the price of Texas and south- 

 western cattle at least $2 per head, and 

 that it is contributing in a marked de- 

 gree to the growth of the cattle industry 

 in Mexico. 



Damage by Insects. Prof. Fletcher, 

 etomologist of Canada alleges that in 

 1891, out of an agricultural product in 

 the United States of $3,800,000,000 there 

 was an actual loss by insects of $380. 000, 

 000, or ten per cent of the whole. 



Tobacco. A San Diego (Cal.) rancher 

 is producing three crops of tobacco 

 from the same four acres of land only 



Possible under irrigation, even in a 

 ivorable climate and a long season. 



The Pomona Brand o f canned toma- 

 toes to be had and will make an except- 

 ionally large pack, of which a large 

 proportion will be consumed at home. 



