PRODUCE OF VALLEY—CLIMATE AND STRUCTURE. 
39 
the valley, and containing the present hed of the river in the lower part of its course; it is 
nearly five miles wide ; above this rises the second terrace to a height of 10 feet above the first; 
it is also a fine stiff clay with less vegetable matter, and of a lighter color than the preceding ; 
its width is a little more, about six miles in breadth ; the third terrace lies at the slope of the 
Gavilan range, is about five miles across in its widest place, and is not so level as the other two 
terraces. It is covered over with the debris of the volcanic rocks and sandstones, and is the 
least fertile; wild mustard covers it to some extent, hut its chief growth is a coarse grass. 
From the silicious character of the soil, it does not seem capable of producing vegetation in 
the abundance which prevails on the lower levels. Much of the lower plain is covered by the 
wild onion; cotton-woods grow on the river hank, which is only 4 to 10. feet below the level of 
the lower terrace; the hed of the stream is a fine white micaceous sandstone, which forms 
quicksands, and renders the fording of the stream very dangerous. 
The capability of production of the lower terraces is very great when put under cultivation. 
At Mr. Hill’s farm near the town of Salinas, sixteen miles east of Monterey, sixty bushels of 
wheat have been raised off the acre, and occasionally eighty-five bushels. Barley, one hundred 
bushels, running up to one hundred and forty-nine bushels, and vegetables in proportion. In 
December, (the time of visit,) these plains were crowded with wild geese, cranes, and brandt. 
The geese are in such multitudes as to darken the air, and cover hundreds of acres when they 
alight. 
During most of the stay on these plains the winds blew from a southerly point, accompanied 
with cold and rain; but when the wind shifted round north and west the rain ceased, and a 
curious phenomenon presented itself—that of immense volumes of clouds pouring into the valley 
from off the sea, and, entering it at its lower portion, rolling along the plain and collecting on 
the hill-tops of the eastern side, depositing its waters there. Such winds blowing over the 
lower valley through the funnel opening at the Bay of Monterey, always occur in California, 
under similar conditions, i. e., whenever there is an opening in the littoral chain to allow the 
shore winds access into the interior, the inward current being produced by the ascent of the 
overheated air of the plain, leaving a partial vacuum, which the sea breeze rushes in to fill. In 
such places a land breeze prevails at night. The influx of such cold winds, charged with moisture, 
lessens the mean temperature of the summer of these plains, while at the same time it adds very 
considerably to the fertility of the soil, which at times would be almost reduced to barrenness 
from the drought. In several places on the middle terrace the soil was cracked in fissures a 
foot wide, some yards long, and 3 or 4 feet in depth, the result of the excessive summer heat on 
a.plastic clay. 
The Gavilan range of hills forms the eastern boundary of this valley. This range at its 
northern part is essentially granitic, flanked on its west side by metamorphic limestone, (crys¬ 
talline carbonate in places,) 300 to 400 feet in thickness ; lower down, the foot hills are made 
up of a series of soft sandstones, which extend in an almost straight line from the mouth of the 
Pajaro to the Mission San Miguel, a distance of eighty or ninety miles. These sedimentary 
beds dip towards the valley, or in a southwest direction, and form the true bottom of the valley, 
having been reached at the depth of 40 feet in sinking a well near Mr. Hill’s. These sandstones 
also form the low hills upon the west side of the valley, where they constitute the base of the 
wide mountain ridge, here one of the coast ranges. This ridge, which commences at Point 
Pinos, the south point of Monterey runs in a southeast direction, and approaches the Salinas 
river fifty-five miles from its mouth, has a central axis of felspathic granite, coarse-grained, and 
