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1916 ANNUAL REPORT 



readily see what this action means to the California grapefruit industry. 

 Every grapefruit sold can be guaranteed as a typical standard Marsh. 



I believe in this day and age no horticulturist or pomologist will 

 admit that a stable fruit industry can be developed on an eighty-six 

 variety basis. As I have just pointed out the success of the citrus in- 

 dustry in this state has been governed, in large measure, by the small 

 number of varieties. Any unprejudiced person will admit that you have 

 too many avocado varieties. I realize when fruits are selling from 50 

 cents to $1.00 apiece, it is hard to sound a note of warning. Still we 

 have to look ahead to the time when avocados are not marketed by the 

 crate but by the carload. I have had enough experience with avocados 

 to know that a good price will be paid for a standard high grade 

 product, while it will not be paid for an inferior one. The statement 

 has been made that in Guatemala, the high plateaus of Mexico, and 

 the Central American countries, there exist avocado varieties far su- 

 perior to any we now have in California. This may be true. I believe 

 new varieties ought to be introduced, provided they are superior to 

 existing standard ones, under state and federal supervision. At the 

 present time Mr. Wilson Popenoe, of the Office of Foreign Seed and 

 Plant Introduction, of the United States Department of Agriculture, is 

 in Guatemala searching for superior avocado varieties. However, even 

 if no new varieties are found superior to those which you now have, I 

 believe you already have in this state a sufficient number from which 

 a few good ones can be chosen and developed as typical California 

 products. 



It never will be possible for you to develop a strong market for 

 avocados if you continue propagating eighty-six varieties. You have 

 got to look ahead to the time when the eastern housewife will call up 

 her grocer or fruit-dealer and order not simply an avocado but a Taft 

 or some other typical variety. I believe your big problem is not a 

 search for new varieties but an elimination of many of those which 

 you are now growing and the choosing and developing of a few which 

 can be known as strictly California products. 



Of your summer varieties, or thin-skinned sorts, an early, a medium, 

 and possibly a late variety are needed and of the thick-skinned winter 

 and spring varieties an early, a medium, a late, and possibly a very 

 late kind. The work which the Citrus Experiment Station has agreed 

 to do in growing trees of the different varieties, at both the Riverside 

 and Whittier stations, will be of great value to the growers but that 

 work ought to be supplemented by definite record work by this Associa- 

 tion. 



Your trees are just coming into bearing. Now is the time to find 

 out the comparative merits of the different varieties. The only way 

 this can be accurately accomplished will be by securing performance 

 records of every individual avocado tree owned by a member of this 

 Association. By performance records we mean the actual record of the 

 amount and quality of fruit produced by an individual tree for a series 

 of years. Only by securing such records on the individual trees of your 

 different varieties for a series of years can you decide on the six or 



