10 BULLETIN 533, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



Joaquin Valley, as it has been in recent years in the Imperial Valley 

 and the Salt River Valley of Arizona. The supply of farm labor 

 now available in the San Joaquin Valley certainly is very much 

 greater than it was half a century ago, when irrigation agriculture 

 was new. How much of the available labor can be applied with 

 advantage to the care and harvesting of a cotton crop is a question 

 that must be decided independently in each community. 



Experience gained in Arizona and elsewhere in the United States 

 in recent years does not indicate that the cotton industry requires or 

 is limited to the use of cheap and irresponsible labor. Dependence 

 on such labor tends rather to injure and restrict the development of 

 cotton culture by keeping it on a low plane, limited to inferior 

 varieties and mixed seed, so that poor and uneven lint is produced, 

 the value of which is still further depreciated by careless harvesting 

 and handling. 



When the several unnecessary wastes and losses are taken into 

 account and the possibilities of avoiding these are recognized, one is 

 brought inevitably to see that the very best quality of agricultural 

 skill and of careful, intelligent labor can be utilized in the production 

 of cotton and that the industry is much more likely to prosper if it 

 can leave behind the tradition^ of cheap labor. Hence, it is not neces- 

 sary to suppose that the establishment of cotton culture in California 

 would increase the present dependence on transient labor. It seems 

 quite as likely to add to the permanent population by making it easier 

 for new settlers to establish themselves. 



Farm work with cotton is not of a nature to be considered as 

 heavier or more laborious than with crops that are already grown in 

 California. Methods of plowing, preparation, and seeding are not 

 unlike those for corn or other tillage crops. Thinning and cultivat- 

 ing make less demands than for sugar beets. The gathering of the 

 crop, though representing by far the largest item of labor cost in 

 the production, is neither a heavy nor an unpleasant kind of work 

 in comparison with the harvesting of many other crops. In com- 

 munities of new settlers or where women and children share in the 

 outdoor work of the farm, the planting by each family of small acre- 

 ages that could be handled without extra labor would be worthy of 

 consideration. The lint as it hangs exposed in the open bolls is 

 perfectly clean and must be kept in that condition if it is to have the 

 highest market value. 



Careless picking diminishes the value of the fiber to the manufac- 

 turer because additional labor and machinery are required to clean 

 the carelessly picked cotton and because some of the fiber is turned 

 into waste as a result of the cleaning operations. An estimate of 

 what it costs the manufacturers every year to overcome by machinery 

 and mill labor the results of carelessness and ignorance in the produc- 



