Southern California and Java 



A. STUDY IX HORTICULTURAL ENTERPRISE 



C. F. BAKER 

 POMONA COLLEGE, CLAREMONT, CALIFORNIA 



Java is not a large country — only a little larger tlian Southern California. 

 It is a country rich in soil and vegetation, yet only about forty per cent, of its 

 territory is said to be under cultivation. It supports a very large population for 

 the size of the country. Its government is administered by the Dutch in a very 

 paternal fashion, but by far-sighted and most intelligent methods. The natives 

 are not highly intellectual nor energetic, so that the present prosperous state of 

 the Island of Java with its now above $1 ;)(),()0(),()()0 of agricultural products per 

 year, must be attributed to those who administer its internal affairs. Other coun- 

 tries and colonies the world over have studied the Javan results with deepest 

 interest. Especially interesting to Southern California, with what is said to be 

 the most highly educated farming community in the whole world, and which 

 aspires to great success in agriculture and horticulture, will it be to examine into 

 the causes of the Javan results with a community largely illiterate. 



In the recently published English translation of that wonderful study by 

 Cabaton, "Java and the Dutch East Indies," we do not find it hard to read the 

 cause of the magnificent success of the Dutch in Java, in their painstaking and 

 unremitting efforts to investigate scientifically and thoroughly all of their condi- 

 tions, and their agricultural problems, and to apply the results. For instance, 

 in connection with the culture of coffee, Cabaton says: "In view of the important 

 part which the cultivation of coffee plays in the colony, the laboratories of Buiten- 

 zorg and the experimental gardens are busily increasing their research work with 

 a view to attacking the parasites of the precious shrub, and to introducing the 

 more productive and resistant varieties. The planters themselves have even 

 founded a station at Buitenzorg which deals with coffee, and they do not, as a 

 rule, undertake the planting of coffee until they have undergone a serious course 

 of study at the Agricultural College of Wageningen in Holland, where the depart- 

 ment of tropical agriculture and arboriculture, together with the courses in Malay 

 and the ethnology of the Archipelago, afford them a very excellent training for 

 the purpose." 



Has Southern California any similar activities to show in connection with orange 

 culture, or any other of our great horticultural interests? We are willing to pay 

 thousands to develop and protect the sale of our products but nothing to bring 

 about more efficient and more effective and more economical production, while as 

 a matter of fact our margin of profit is as likely to be built up by the latter method 

 as by the former. Our growers pay shocking prices for experience laboriously 

 gained without previous preparation or technical knowledge to back it up. Thou- 

 sands upon thousands of dollars are annually lost in the citrus business in our 

 present lack of system in fumigation work, and in the wide-spread unwisdom with 



