PART SEVENTH: NUTS, 
CHAPTER AST. 
NUT GROWING IN CALIFORNIA. 
Two nuts have risen to large commercial importance in 
California: the English walnut and the almond. Other nuts 
than these, except peanuts, have never attained great acreage, 
although several have sticceeded and promise to hecome popular. 
The walnut has thus far only been produced in large quan- 
tities in Santa Rarbara, Ventura, Los’ Angeles, and Orange 
Counties, and an aggregate annual product of eight and a 
quarter million pounds has been attained in this district. The 
almond product, which in some years amounts to five hundred 
thousand pounds, has been chiefly grown in central California. 
THE ALMOND. 
The almond has an interesting history in California, but it 
can be outlined in a few sentences. The importation of the 
best European varieties began very early, and a number of them 
had been planted in 1853. They proved irregular bearers, 
though the trees grew thrittily and in some cases showed fruit 
very soon after planting. The barren almond trees were largely 
grafted into prunes or made into firewood and the conclusion 
was reached that to secure regularity and abundance in fruiting, 
locations for almond orchards must be sought with the utmost 
care, and that the secret of success lay in the location. After 
that local seedlings seemed to demonstrate their value in regular 
crops, and in characteristics and qualities superior to foreign 
kinds. Large planting was then undertaken on the ground that 
the choice of soil and situation, and the selection of trustworthy 
varieties, are both iactors of success, but that possibly more lay 
in the choice of varietv than of location. This belief led to wide 
planting in locations now seen to be unfitted by reason of frosts 
and at the close of the century the almond acreage is being re- 
duced by cutting out unprofitable trees, and it seems to be fully 
demonstrated that no matter what variety is chosen, locations 
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