446 CALIFORNIA FRUIT SOCIETIES. 



sands; root-knot, thousands more; standing water in a wet 

 winter is very destructive; and thousands of full-grown trees 

 die annually, often fully laden with fruit, and for no cause 

 whatever that can be discovered. A great loss also arises from 

 the digging up or regrafting trees which have, after years of 

 cultivation, been found unprofitable; it is not every tree that 

 will be profitable in every place, and the infinite variety of 

 soil and exposure, which is one of the attractions of California, 

 vastly multiplies the chances of error in planting ; nor do all 

 varieties which thrive and bear well prove profitable; nor are 

 varieties which yield profit in one locality sure to be desirable 

 in other places where they ripen earlier or later; and it often 

 happens that varieties for which there is a limited sale at fair 

 prices, become utterly profitless when production is increased ; 

 and of the varieties which have to be sold fresh, there is not 

 only the risk of crop failure which attaches to all plantings, 

 but some years and from some localities they are found to 

 " carry" well, and arrive in good condition after long journeys, 

 and sometimes they do not. In fact, there is no end to the 

 variety of risks which assail the business from all sides, and 

 the replanting and regrafting of orchards is constantly in 

 progress, so that to this time I believe that fifteen years would 

 be an extreme limit to assign as the life of a tree in California. 

 Of course a great part of this tree loss is preventable; and the 

 most competent and experienced have never suffered as 

 severely as I have indicated, and perhaps no single orchardist 

 has endured all the misfortunes which I have mentioned ; but 

 I am considering average conditions, and a certain amount of 

 -risk is inevitable. So that, even allowing for tlie better results 

 which experience has brought, I can not put the expected 

 average life of a fruit tree in California as above twenty years, 

 or the average number of crops to be expected as over fifteen. 

 There is also to be considered the inevitable deterioration of 

 the soil, by reason of which, except in so far as it is combated 

 by expensive fertilizers, the quantity and quality of the fruit 

 crops will diminish as certainly as the quantity and quality of 

 the wheat crop has diminished. Finally, it inevitably hap- 

 pened that,under theunreasonablestimulus applied, the produc- 



