HUMAN EFFORT AS A FACTOR IN PRODUCTION 235 



farm work. The need is made all the greater by the fact that in 

 marketing the products frequently much additional labor is required 

 to "man" packing houses, canneries, or wineries. At Vacaville 

 4,000 persons must come from other localities to assist in picking, 

 packing, and drying the fruit. At Watsonville 2,000 laborers are 

 required from other localities to assist with the strawberry and apple 

 harvests, which are separated by a period of many weeks. At 

 Fresno from 3,000 to 4,000 extra laborers are needed for three weeks 

 in the autumn to harvest the raisin grapes, while others are required 

 in the packing houses and wineries. About Oxnard for several weeks 

 2,000 extra men are needed. Instances are fairly general of a speciali- 

 zation by communities which requires for a time a labor force larger 

 than that which is normally supported by the community. The prob- 

 lems thus indicated the Chinese and Japanese have solved. They are 

 accustomed to hand labor, have usually been without family, and 

 could easily migrate from one community to another; have been 

 provided with comparatively cheap lodgings and have boarded them- 

 selves, when white men, as a rule, must be provided with board; and 

 have been organized so that it was possible for the grower to secure 

 the number of men desired, and have them supervised and paid off 

 and discharged, as a group, by the "boss" of their own nationality. 



The Japanese agricultural laborers were at first almost all of the 

 migratory class engaged in seasonal work only. Gradually, however, 

 an increasing percentage of them have found employment in the same 

 locality throughout the year. A small percentage, also, as among the 

 Chinese, have come to engage in occupations requiring work with 

 teams. Most of these, however, are farming for themselves or are 

 employees of farmers, for among the Japanese, as well as Chinese, 

 Italians, and Portuguese, there is a strong tendency to employ only 

 persons of their own race to fill all positions. 



Within ten years the Japanese have become conspicuous as 

 farmers. In California, according to the returns made to the secre- 

 taries of Japanese associations, which, where checked, have been 

 found to be approximately correct, the members of this race in 1909 

 owned 16,449^ acres of agricultural land and leased 137,233^ more, 

 80,232 acres of it for cash and 57,001^ for a share of the crop. This 

 does not include so-called "contract leases," where a part of the work 

 involved is covered by a contract for the season or a period of years. 

 The amount of land controlled by. Japanese in several other states 

 in the West was in 1909 approximately as follows: Colorado, 20,000 



