EDITORIAL 75 



which San Francisco markets are supplied. Along the foothills of the 

 Sierra there lies a belt of varying width of heavy red clay lands, probably 

 derived from lone formation, and frequently closely packed with 

 gravel. These materials are intrinsically poor in plant food and being 

 difficultly penetrable by roots, have caused much disappointment to 

 settlers, and were the first to be treated by the energetic method of 

 blasting with dynamite for fruit culture. They improve materially 

 toward the south and in Fresno county form the basis for successful 

 citrus culture. Higher up in the foothills come the characteristic red 

 soils, the gold-bearing earths, mostly derived from the older slates and 

 sedentary thereon. They are interpersed with patches of gray " granite " 

 lands, which are very much less productive, being derived from the 

 granodiorites, deficient in potash and phosphoric acid. 



The soils of the Coast Ranges vary greatly, with their varying rock 

 formations, among which are much clay and clay shale, forming corres- 

 pondingly heavy soils. But the valleys also are filled with deep silty 

 or sandy deposits. Southward the Coast Ranges are continued in the 

 Sierra Madre, which forms the northern wall of the valley of southern 

 California. 



This valley, now subdivided into the drainage basins of the Santa 

 Ana and San Gabriel, was undoubtedly originally a unit. This is 

 proved by a terrace of "red lands," which extends all around from 

 Redlands and Riverside to Los Angeles. Its subdivision was effected 

 in late times by the great debris cone of the San Antonio Creek, which 

 abutting against the Puente hills cut the drainage in two. The red 

 soils are the special ones for citrus culture; but the sandy and silty 

 alluvium of the two rivers also serves the same purpose. 



The Neocene Basins of the Klamath Mountains. By F. M. 

 Anderson, Berkeley, Cal. Presented by Andrew C. Law- 

 son. 

 This paper is an attempt to show some of the more salient struc- 

 tural features of the Klamath Mountains, including not only their 

 basins, but also their principal ranges. The three chief ranges of the 

 group, extending in a northeasterly direction from the coast, and the 

 drainage basins intervening and otherwise associated, form the main 

 subject of discussion. Of the two systems of ranges crossing each 

 other nearly at right angles, the northeast and southwest ranges are 

 the older, and have exerted a controlling influence over the drainage 



