14 CALIFORNIA VEGETABLES 



The group "other vegetables" includes about 25,000 cases each 

 of spinach and squash, 10,000 of pumpkin and 5000 of kraut. 



Thus it appears that the product has doubled in four years. A 

 discussion of vegetables from a canner's point of view will be given 

 in a subsequent chapter. 



Drying vegetables has been pursued in a small way for a num- 

 ber of years, and was stimulated to great expectations when the 

 Alaska mining interest arose and packing food over mountain trails 

 was involved, but wherever transportation routes are established 

 the superior succulence of fresh and canned vegetables discounts 

 the dried product and the latter has not reached great commercial 

 importance. 



Value of California Vegetable Products. The latest authori- 

 tative figures of the acreage and value of the products included in 

 this treatise are those of the U. S. Census of 1909, which are now 

 wholly inadequate. The latest records in the case of individual 

 crops will be given, so far as available, in the chapters severally de- 

 voted to them. For a general citation of values, figures are drawn 

 chiefly from the estimates of the California Development Board as 

 published in its report for 1917, viz: 



Sugar beet $ 7,500,000 



Potatoes 14,805,000 



Potatoes, sweet 960,000 



Beans 20,875,000 



Onions 4,000,000 



Melons 4,000,000 



Seeds, etc 3,000,000 



Fresh vegetables 12,000,000 



Total $67,140,000 



Diversity in Garden Practice in California. It is hardly too 

 much to say that California garden practice is an epitome of ancient 

 and modern cultural arts, for we have both survival of very old 

 methods and subterfuges and wider demonstrations of the truth of 

 advanced conceptions of cultural efficacy than can probably be 

 found in any other state. This is not due to any purpose or design 

 on the part of our people. It is merely their notable resources of 

 adaptability and ingenuity brought to bear upon the wide range of 

 conditions involved in our combined winter and summer gardening 

 which concentrates in a single commonwealth all the diversity one 

 might encounter if he were a peripatetic gardener with an itinerary 

 extending from Ireland to Algeria. Nor is this remark intended 

 merely as a reference to the natural diversity of the different parts 

 of the state, because success may require more or less distinct 

 methods in summer and winter in the same region. In short, the 

 California gardener has to know arid-land practice and humid-land 

 practice and call them both into requisition equally or incline toward 



