BRITISH NORTH AMERICA 



BRITISH NORTH AMERICA 575 



The second great horticultural region of southern 

 British Columbia is the dry-belt. It lies just east of 

 the Cascade Mountains, is about 200 miles wide and 

 extends northwest from the interior boundary about 

 250 miles. In it are districts Nos. 3, 5, 6 and 7 as indi- 

 cated on the map. Its valleys lie at an elevation of 800 to 

 1,500 feet above sea-level. The annual precipitation 

 totals from 9 to 15 inches, distributed fairly evenly 

 throughout the months of. the year. The atmosphere is 

 dry and bracing. Sunshine is plentiful and in the sum 

 mer months almost constant. The winter extremes of 

 tcmiM'rature are lower than on the coast, and the sum- 

 mers are very much warmer. It is the great apple-, 

 prach-, tomato- and potato-producing district of the 

 province, all of its products being grown under irrigat ion, 

 and mostly marketed in carloads on the coast and in the 

 prairies. Of its valleys, the Okanagan (No. 5) is the most 

 advanced and the largest shipper; Thompson River 

 No. 3) and the Kettle River (\o. 7) produce winter 

 apples and potatoes as their staple crop, while the 

 Similkameen Valley (No. 6) produces principally 

 peaches and winter apples. 



The third great horticultural region in British Col- 

 umbia may be called the semi-humid interior belt, 

 embracing districts Nos. 4 and 8. Here irrigation for 

 most crops is not necessary, although for small fruits it 

 is desirable. The annual precipitation runs from 18 to 

 45 inches, a considerable portion of which falls as snow, 

 while June is a month of considerable rainfall. The air 

 is more humid than in the dry-belt and extremes of 

 temperature of winter and summer are not so great. 

 The humidity makes fungous diseases a problem and 

 spraying for apple-scab is necessary. Unlike the dry- 

 belt, it is a timbered country, and the cost of land- 

 clearing offsets the cost of irrigation systems in the 

 former. District No. 4, in the water-shed of Shuswap 

 Lake, is as well advanced as the Okanagan Valley, the 

 principal shipments from Armstrong and Salmon Arm 

 being apples, potatoes, celery and cabbage. District 

 No. 8, the West Kootenay, has not thus far been a 

 shipping district, the local demand in the mining 

 camps of Rossland, Slocan and the Crow's Nest con- 

 suming more than the locality produces. 



The following tabular statement indicates the adap- 

 tabilities of the different regions: 



The Dominion census of 1891 credited fruit with a 

 total of 6,500 acres. By 1901 this had been increased 

 only to 7,500 acres, but in the decade just passed tree- 

 fruit-planting has had a tremendous impetus and the 

 acreage at the beginning of 1912 was thought to be 

 around 40,000 acres, of which 93 per cent is apples, 4 

 per cent pears; the remainder, plums, prunes, cherries, 

 apricots and peaches. The report of the provincial 

 statistician shows that in 1911 there were 15,454 acres 

 of vegetables, of which potatoes constitute some 13,000 

 acres, tomatoes and onions supplying the majority 

 of the balance. Potatoes average 6.9 tons or 230 

 bushels to the acre, while other truck crops average 

 11.4 tons to the acre. The value of the fruit and vege- 

 table products of 1911 was $5,084,241. 



In floriculture and in landscape gardening, British 

 Columbia is only making the first steps. In the cities, 

 especially those of the coast, there are many fine gar- 

 dens and estates, and the coast cities are developing 

 admirable park systems. 



The exact records of the first fruit trees imported, it 

 has not been possible to obtain. It has been learned 

 that the Hudson Bay Company was instrumental in 

 bringing the seeds or seedling apples from California 

 to its forts Camosum and Langley sometime previous 

 to 1850., These old orchards are not now in existence. 

 Orchard-planting on the coast during the period 1850 to 

 1885 was almost altogether of an experimental char- 

 acter, and nothing commercial was expected from it. 

 From that time, and especially after the formation of 

 the British Columbia Fruit-Growers' Association in 

 1890, experiments in commercial orcharding were 

 begun. Among the first orchards in the interior coun- 

 try might be mentioned those of Thomas G. Earl of 

 Lytton; that of Fred Gartrell at Trout Creek; and 

 that of Frank Richter at Keremeos. Later on came 

 the planting of the Coldstream orchards owned by Lord 

 Aberdeen, under the supervision of John Craig, and 

 T. W. Stirling's orchard at Kelowna. All of these 

 orchards are still in bearing and have produced the 

 wonderful fruit that has done so much to stimulate 

 the large plantings that occurred between 1900 and 

 1912. 



The British Columbia Fruit-Growers' Association, 

 founded in 1890, has been in continuous activity since 

 that time, and has done a great deal to stimulate and 

 encourage the fruit industry and to secure governmental 

 aid and recognition for it. With the British Columbia 

 Fruit-Growers' Association are affiliated all the fruit- 

 shipping and educational fruit-growers' organizations 

 of the province. 



The provincial Department of Agriculture has done 

 very much to stimulate interest in the industry, and to 

 protect it from the invasion of insect pests. The Hor- 

 ticultural Board, organized under the auspices of the 

 Department to study the problems connected with the 

 industry, and especially the control of pests, has through 

 its inspectors succeeded in keeping the province free of 

 codlin-moth, San Jos6 scale, Colorado potato-beetle, 

 plum curculio and many other insect pests which in- 

 crease the cost of production in other districts. 



Four years ago the Department organized the Hor- 

 ticultural Branch, which is devoted to supplying in- 

 formation on horticultural subjects to the many new 

 settlers embarking in the industry. The Horticultural 

 Branch maintains sufficient assistant horticulturists to 

 forward this work in the various districts. It has 

 inaugurated a series of schools to teach fruit-packing, 

 publishes literature including a list of fruits recom- 

 mended for planting, and is generally at the service of 

 the fruit industry along these lines. The Department 

 has done much to make the possibilities of the province 

 known by means of advertising and inspection work, 

 British Columbia having won the highest possible 

 awards from the Royal Horticultural Society in Ix>n- 

 don, England, against all the other colonies of the 



