THIRTY-FOURTH FRUIT-GROWERS' C0N\T:NTI0X. 



97 



PRESIDENT JEFFREY. I will uuw have the pleasure of intro- 

 during Mr. R. C. Allen. 



MR. ALLEN. Mr, Teague has covered this subject so fully that there 

 is really hardly anything that any one else can say. I will sa}' that last 

 night, in speaking to Professor Powell, and asking him if he were 

 likely to continue the same Avork which he has done for the orange to 

 the lemon business, he said he thought not, that he thought it didn't 

 need it, that it was quite evident that the chief thing needed in the 

 lemon business is care. Doubtless that is true. But I disagree with him 

 to this extent, that I think the same thing was realized b}^ people in the 

 orange business, but the work he forced on them called the people's 

 attention to it, and they commenced to do something. I think the same 

 thing is needed in.the lemon business. 



GROWING INTEREST IN LEMON CULTURE. 



By R. C. ALLEN, of San Diego. 



The lemon industry of California seems, with the present season, to 

 have entered on a new phase of its career. First, we had the period, 

 in common with most of the important fruit crops of this State, when 

 production was small, and the only competition, that of the imported 

 fruit, selling at very high prices. This was the time when ^[r. Blanchard 

 of Santa Paula and Mr. Johnson of Santa Barbara organized the lemon 

 business and made good profits. After this, we had the boom of the 

 early nineties and large plantings. When these plantings came into 

 bearing and we had to invade the Eastern markets in order to find 

 an outlet for the increasing product, methods which had served for 

 the industry on a small scale had to be modified. There was much 

 complaint at the poor keeping quality of the California lemon as 

 compared with the Sicilian. 



The general result was little profit to the grower, in many cases 

 heavy loss, and soon there was a pretty general budding of lemon to 

 orange trees. Though some few^ careful packers succeeded in building 

 up a good name for their product, in general California lemons had a 

 bad name. However, improved methods all along the line, in orchard 

 handling and in the packing house, were putting the better packers and 

 associations on to the high road to success, when some three or four 

 years ago a severe frost in Sicily cut off imports to a low figure. Since 

 then, and up to the present season, the general markets, both summer 

 and winter, have been so good that there has been no chance of loss-, 

 even for the most careless and inexperienced, though the shrewd and 

 skillful reaped the largest rewards. Obviously this was a state of 

 affairs that could not last, but a great and permanent good was 

 accomplished during the shortage of imports in the introduction of our 

 California lemon into many new markets, where it has become strongly 

 intrenched and will not easily be driven out. 



Nevertheless, we have plainly reached a point where competition is 

 again to be keen, and where there will be profit only to those who turn 

 out a good article and build up an established reputation. Nuts, dried 

 fruit, and, in fact, many of our products sell for what they are — on 



7 — FGC 



