Citrus and Tropical Fruit Culture 
state of perfection in the interior valleys, where the 
day and night temperature during the summer months 
is more nearly uniform. 
Another feature favorable to pomelo culture is the 
fact that they, in common with oranges, are being 
more generally used throughout the entire year, thus 
increasing their consumption to a great extent. This 
is particularly favorable for California, as our 
pomelos are at their best during the summer months 
when the Florida fruit is off the market. 
With the improvement in types, and by holding 
our fruit until it is mature, we can establish a reputa- 
tion for quality that will not only increase the con- 
sumption in the United States, but may lead to a 
large export trade to foreign countries where pomelos 
are at present very little known. 
It will be of interest to note the increase of citrus 
products in this state. Beginning with the year 1883, 
when there were shipped out of Southern California 
150 carloads of oranges; in 1886 the output had in- 
creased to 1,000 carloads; in 1890-'91 there were 
shipped 3920 carloads, and in 1898-'99 a total of 
15,006 carloads were sent out. Of this amount 
1.500 cars were lemons 
Ten years later, for the season 1908-'09, there 
were 6,196 cars of lemons and 31,895 cars of oranges, 
a total of 38,091 cars from Southern California and 
2.501 cars of oranges and lemons from points north 
of the Tehachapi: 
For 1920 the total production of oranges was 
18,700,000 boxes, and of lemons 4,500,000 boxes; 
the combined value of which was $54,125,000. 
The present annual income from California's 
citrus crop is something like $50,000,000.00, and the 
value of the orchards themselves is approximately 
$400,000,000.00. 
GROWING TEAGUE QUALITY TREES 
It will no doubt be of interest to those engaged in 
citrus culture to know how we grow our nursery 
trees. We feel that the buyer is entitled to know 
what care and attention has been bestowed upon the 
trees he is paying out good money for and on which 
he expects to spend more money and time in bringing 
them to a profitable bearing stage. For upon the 
proper methods of budding, growing and handling of 
the young trees in the nursery row, largely depends 
the success or failure of the planter to realize a prof- 
itable orchard (it being assumed that he is going to 
do his part in caring for the orchard), we are sure 
that every planter wants to feel assured that the 
nurseryman has left nothing undone that might affect 
the future growth and productiveness of his orchard. 
With that idea in view, we shall briefly describe the 
essentials in the production of Teague quality trees. 
As far as possible we grow our own seedling stock 
and for this purpose select the best sour orange seed 
available. In order to insure hardy plants, we sow 
our seed in the open and allow it to come up and 
make its first season's growth under natural condi- 
tions. In transplanting the young seedlings to the 
nursery row, we select only those showing the most 
vigor and hardiness, the remainder being discarded. 
Every care is exercised in digging to secure all the 
fibrous roots possible and extreme precaution is used 
in protecting the same from the sun and air while 
moving them from the seed-bed to the nursery row. 
We plant all of our stock fifteen inches apart in the 
row and the rows four feet apart. This allows plenty 
of room for irrigating, cultivating and hoeing and 
insures a strong, vigorous tree. Only such pruning 
is done as is necessary to keep the trunk of the young 
tree free from sprouts and side branches up from the 
surface of the ground some 6 or 8 inches. 
The seedlings are allowed to make two summer's 
growth in the nursery row before they are budded. 
This gives us a seedling with sufficient strength and 
vigor to force a good thrifty bud. In budding, we 
aim to get the bud from six to eight inches above 
the surface of the ground, which allows plenty of 
room so that with ordinary care in planting there is 
no danger of getting the bud set below the level of 
the soil a condition that is almost sure to be fatal 
to all varieties of budded citrus trees, especially if 
planted on heavy land. 
The budding is done in the fall and spring, Octo- 
ber and November being the two falls months in 
which it is done and April and May the usual time 
for spring budding. The advantage of fall budding 
is that they heel in, but do not make any growth until 
spring, when they are ready to start with the first 
flow of sap and are usually a foot or more high before 
it is possible to begin the spring budding. 
BUD SELECTION 
One of the most important parts in the growing of 
good nursery stock, and one which we have always 
given very close attention, is the matter of selecting 
good buds and we point with pardonable pride to the 
many profitable orchards in different parts of Cali- 
fornia grown from trees of our own raising. Realiz- 
ing that in order to produce trees yielding good crops 
of high grade fruit, it is necessary to select buds 
from the best and most prolific types of the varieties 
desired, we have always exercised every precaution to 
get only the best. 
With the advent of what is known as pedigreed or 
selected buds, that is the selection of buds taken from 
trees having a record for quality and quantity pro- 
ductiveness, we have decided to use only this kind 
of buds. For the purpose of enabling the reader to 
realize the importance of this feature, we will give 
a brief history of the events leading up to the estab- 
lishment of the bud selection department of the Fruit 
Growers' Supply Company. 
Going back to the time when the orchard industry 
was in its infancy, when what few orchards there 
were consisted almost entirely of seedling orange 
trees, grown from seed selected at random from trees 
producing desirable types of fruit, little attention was 
paid to any particular selection of seed or plants and 
the grower who made any effort to select seed from 
