134 PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SIXTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



THE OEANGE IN NOKTHERN OALIFOENIA. 



By D. H. MURRAY, of Orovillb, 

 Superintendent of Oroville Citrus Association. 



The culture of citrus fruits, especially the orange, in the northern 

 parts of California, particularly so in the foothill regions of Placer, 

 Yuba, Sutter, Glenn, Tehama, and more especially Butte County, is 

 rapidly assuming a place of importance. 



Fifteen years ago last September, on my departure from Riverside, in 

 Southern California, to assume the position I now hold, I was told by 

 many that the people north, in Butte County, thought they could raise 

 oranges, but that they would soon find their mistake and give it up as a 

 bad job. 



It did not take long to discover that oranges were growing here, and 

 now it is an acknowledged fact; and a desire for a practical knowledge 

 of their propagation and culture has so steadily increased in the above 

 mentioned counties, that you can now find large orange groves of all 

 ages, from one to fifteen years, and they certainly rank with the best 

 groves in the State. These groves are not only growing, showing a 

 dark, rich green color, but they are yielding an abundance of fruit, 

 which gives the happy owner, in return for his labor, a well-filled 

 pocket. 



Butte County can boast of having at the present time five thousand 

 acres of the golden fruit, and turned out last year, as I have been told, 

 in the neighborhood of five hundred carloads. This year the county 

 expects to put these figures away in the shade, as the crop is estimated 

 to be much heavier this year than it was last. The bulk of the crop 

 will be gathered from the magnificent groves of Palermo and Ther- 

 malito, together with outlying districts, and from Qroville and vicinity. 



In regard to the other counties, I have not been able to obtain the 

 number of trees planted, or the output of fruit for the last year. Still, 

 I have been informed that the crop is much heavier this year than it 

 was last season. These counties will certainly do their share in turn- 

 ing out a larger percentage of fruit this year than last. We will not 

 only have a larger quantity, but the fruit will be of a far superio'r 

 quality to any that has been turned out before. 



Tehama and Glenn counties are forging to the front. The well- 

 known Maywood Colony, in Tehama County, has planted in the last 

 two years in the neighborhood of twenty thousand citrus trees, which, I 

 have been informed by the owners, are doing well. 



The question is often asked by strangers on arriving at some aban- 

 doned grove, ''What is the cause of the trees all dying?" I may say 

 that in this county, as well as in the above mentioned counties, hun- 



