CHAPTER XXXIV 

 THE LEMON AND MINOR CITRUS FRUITS 



Lemon growing is a very unique and distinctive branch of Cali- 

 fornia horticulture, which in the present advancement of culture 

 and preparation for the market, well illustrates the originality and 

 invention which the California fruit grower has displayed in his 

 undertakings. Lemon growing in California is old because it arose 

 at the old missions in the second century back of us, but success- 

 ful lemon growing as a great industry is new and constantly assum- 

 ing new phases. For the old seedling lemons were bad, and 

 though enterprising growers soon learned that fact and set about 

 getting better ones, it took years to secure them and to learn how 

 to grow and handle them so that the Californian could displace 

 the Sicilian fruit in the markets of the United States. Nor was 

 time the only thing sacrificed hundreds of thousands of dollars 

 were lost before the California grower could put upon the market 

 a good lemon, fit to stay good for a sufficient length of time. Un- 

 profitable plantings; expensive curing houses, which did not cure 

 well ; countless experiments which yielded only loss and disappoint- 

 ment all these are wrecks upon the rock of American lemon grow- 

 ing. 



Naturally Californians sought first to know how lemons were 

 grown and handled abroad. At cost of great effort and outlay they 

 learned practically nothing that they could do and a great deal 

 that it was not necessary to do. Then they assumed a more rational 

 mood a disposition to discern what principles are involved in the 

 problem, and to apply them in their own way according to con- 

 ditions locally prevailing. Along this line grand success has been 

 attained by a few masterful men conducting large lemon enter- 

 prises or smaller undertakings of their own, while the mass of 

 lemon planters, for one reason or another, have never reaped the 

 reward they expected. On the whole, it may be said that lemon 

 growing is a much harder and more exacting enterprise than orange 

 growing, and for this reason many have new-topped their trees to 

 oranges and thus escape difficulties which they could not overcome. 



With the aid of the protective tariff the most resolute and 

 capable have attained success, and now the California lemon is 

 highly esteemed upon its merits everywhere. The tariff has some- 

 what reduced the effect of cheap labor in Italy and cheap water 

 transportation from the Mediterranean region, and our lemons can 

 sometimes compete with the foreign product not only in the west. 



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