USA > California > Merced County > History of Merced County, California with biographical sketches of prominent citizens > Part 46
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50
It furnishes the best lumber in the State for the "inside work " of houses, and is the chief building material used in the Sierra Nevada. The tree derives its name from a sweet resin which exudes from the duramen, or hard wood of the tree. This resin is sugar-like in appearance, granulation and taste, and could not be distinguished from the manna of the drug- stores, except by a slight terebiuthine flavor. The pine sugar is cathartic. It is found in small quantities only, though it is said 150 pounds of it were collected by a man who devoted himself for a few weeks to the business of gathering it.
Torryae Californica-Nutmeg Tree-A valuable timber. The nuts are not like the nutmeg, except in appearance outside. The meat is edible, but the squirrels usually get it ; grows fifty to eighty feet high and two or three feet in diameter.
Lipcedrus Decurrens-White Cedar-Is found from Mount Shasta to the Tejon Pass. The trunk is usually angular. It grows one hundred feet in height and seven feet thick in the trunk. Found in all the small valleys of the Sierras. Pinus Tuberculata-Knotty Pine-A handsome little pine, forty to sixty feet high, with symmetrical clusters of cones. Abies Douglasii-Douglas Spruce-Next to the sugar pine in size and value for lumber.
Pinus Ponderosa-Western Yellow Pine-Is quite common in the Sierras for their entire length. Large size.
During the late war the manufacture of turpentine was in- terfered with and some parties went into its manufacture from this tree. A hole was cut in the side of the tree in the spring, and the semi-fluid pitch which collected there was put into a retort and distilled, the volatile portion passing off iu vapor, and afterwards condensing into turpentine, while the solid mat- ter remained in the form of resin. This industry was very active for four or five years, but at last has ceased, as North Carolina has again resumed her old industry, and can make resin and turpentine cheaper than we can.
Pinus Subiniana-Nut Pine-Found in most all pine forests of the Sierras and foot-hills.
Some turpentine makers tried to distill the pitch of this pine, and after some difficulty succeeded, but found that the liquid produced was different from turpentine, being much lighter and possessing a pleasant odor. It was first named erasine, but druggists who have sought to convey the idea that they had exclusive possession of it have called it aurantine, theoline, abietine, and various other names. It is excellent for dissolv- ing grease, and its vapors are fatal to moths.
The manufacturers of erasine buy their pitch delivered at $3.50 per one hundred pounds-the price being about twice as high as that of the pitch from the common yellow pine trees. The latter are larger and grow in denser forests, so that one man can collect more in a day. The pitch-gatlierer cuts a notch
eight or ten inches wide across the tree, and three or four inches deep, with a depression that will hold the sap, which is transferred once a month to a tin can. A tree two feet in diameter will yield from three to four gallons the first year, and more the second and third; and forty gallons of the crude pitch will when distilled, give five gallons of erasine.
TAXODIUM FAMILY.
Sequoia Gigantea-" Big Trees"-These immense kings of veg- etable life are only found in groves in a few places iu the Sierra Nevadas .*
These are the royal family of trees, royal in all respects- splendid growth, beauty, fine lumber properties and inumnense size. Peers and dukes in other lands they rise here to the su- preme dignity of monarchs. The Sequoias hold the first place among all the grand forests of the world, outranking all the other brotherhood of trees iu majestic height.
These are some of the chief trees aud shrubs to be found in the valleys, foot-hills and mountains from the Coast Rauge in to the Sierra Nevadas. While many of these are commonly seen in the valleys and ravines, others are rarely found except upon the highest mountain sides.
Other trees may be discovered. The recesses of valley and inountain have not all been explored as yet by the botanists, and it is likely many additions to the flora of this region will be made.
California has no in ligenous eluns, hickory, beech, birch, persimmon, mulberry, sassafras, locust, catalpa, or magnolia trees. We have willows and cottonwood, which differ little in appearance from those of the Mississippi Valley.
It may be asked, If these groves of timber in these mount- ains should be cut away would not the region become barren. We think not; for a score of young sprouts will imme liately spring from the stump of a fallen tree, and the certainty of the rains would in a little time bring into existence a crop of trees to take the place of the fallen ones. Although the supply of timber is very great in these mountains it caunot be considered inexhaustible. The rapid increase of population, and demaud for building material and fuel will, in time, lead to the denuda- tion of the regiou nearest to the large cities. Consequently a preservative policy should be adopted at an early day, by which a portion of the land should retain, at least, the younger growth for future use. It would, indeed, be a wise policy to enforce a law to this effect if it cannot be done otherwise. The general future good of our State requires it, and especially the places in and near the timbered lands.
WILD BERRIES, FRUITS AND ROOTS.
There are wild ,grapes, blackberries, gooseberries, huckleber- ries, raspberries, salmonberries, and strawberries. The rasp- berry grew wild, but never in the great quantities in which the blackberry was found. The latter, for a great many years, was quite a source of revenue to the Indian squaws, who gathered and sold them to the whites. There are a few left yet, but the great bulk of the vines have had to give place to products of greater value. Our wild blackberry is not so large as the tame, nor as the wild berry of the Eastern States, but it is of a very much better flavor than either. The wild grape grows all through the timber along the river. The herry
* All the "big tree groves" are fully described in another article.
218
HISTORY OF MERCED COUNTY.
is small and very full of seed, but when perfectly ripe, has a very fine flavor. It is better for jelly than any other.
Chlorogulum Pomeridianum-The amole, or soap plant, has an onion-like, bulbons root, which, when rubbed in water, makes a lather like soap, aud is good for removing dirt.
It was extensively usedl for washing by the Indians aud Spanish Californians, previous to the American conquest. The amole has a stalk four or five feet high, from which branches about eighteen inches long spring out. The branches are covered with buds, which open in the night, beginning at tbe root of the boughs, about four inches of a branch opening at a time. The next night, tbe buds of another four inches open, and so on. The dry bulb abounds in tough fibers, which are separated from the other material, and used as a substitute for hair in mattresses.
A truffle, or a root resembling it, is found in the valleys. The grizzly bear considers it a delicacy, and frequently digs it up.
Of the barberries, we bave three or four shrubby plants, all worthy members of that family. Some are used in medicine, and others have berries not unpleasant to eat.
Liliorhiza Lanceolata .- It is among the earliest spring flowers. Has a rather unpleasant odor.
It is among the earliest of our spring blooming bulbs, with a habit and appearance slightly similar to the spring snowdrop, wbich is so much prized in the Eastern States. Its flower stein, which has but few leaves, is from six to fifteen inches high; the scattered leaves run into bracts near the summit, from whose axils spring the flowers, which at first appear to project outward, but gradually droop with age.
The blooming bulbs ofteu grow at a depth of a foot or more in a stiff adobe, and as the bulbs are composed of several loosely coherent scales, it is often very difficult to obtain them entire. The bulbs are a clear, waxy white, and sometimes attain a diameter of one and one-half inches.
CREEPING VINES AND PLANTS.
Along the lower land of the river and sloughs, and among the timber, the wild pea, or pea-vine, grew to a very great beight.
There is a wild bemp growing upon tbe lowlands, fron which the Indians used to make fish-nets, and rope for all pur- poses. It grows to a great height, and we have tbought it possible to make its cultivation of practical value. The bark is, bowever, covered with a very fine nettle, which is extremely painful when it comes in contact with the skin. The nettle is less than a sixteenth of an inch in lengtb, and is as fine as it is possible to conceive of, but it will irritate the skin of cattle and horses as readily as that of a man.
Yerba Buena-"Good herb " in Spanish. It is found in the valleys of the mountains.
It is a creeping vine, bearing some resemblance in its leaf and vine to the wild strawberry. It has a strong perfume, balf-way between peppermint and campbor.
Wild tobacco grows on the sand-bars and otber low land. The Indians used it, but the leaf is very small. The flower and the seed-pods are, however, exactly like our cultivated tobacco.
Clematis-May be seen climbing over trees and bushes along our creeks.
Wben the white, silky flowers are gone, the fruiting, with its long white tails (one to two inches), gives the trees over which it twines a beautiful appearance during the winter months.
Anemone Nemorosa-" Wind Flower " -- The little flower so much loved in the East. With us it grows larger, and noue tbe less beautiful.
Aquilegia Truncuta-the Columbine-It bas a beauty not inferior to any of its relatives, aud the larkspurs, of which there are four or five species, all pereunial, bave great beauty.
Megarrhiza-commonly known as " Big Root "-It is found twining over trees and undergrowth, and is a vine some- what like a cucumber.
It bears a fruit about the size of a peach, covered with prickles. Often the root is twelve to fifteen inches in diameter, and four of five feet loug, whilst the vine may be fifty long.
Another vine often found with the above, is a convolvulus (C. Occidentalis). It has white flowers, large and handsome.
SWAMP VEGETATION.
Scirpus Lacustris-the Round Tule-The principal species has no leaf, but a plain round stalk, sometimes an inch thick at the butt and fifteen feet high, but usually not more than half so large.
It will grow in places constantly covered with water several feet deep, forms a thick mat with its roots, and cannot be killed readily. The swamp lands abound with reeds, or tule, as they are here called.
The triangular tule grows in shallow water, or in land dry for portions of the year, and neat cattle get fat on it.
The cat-tail flag grows with the tule, but in dryer land tban the others, and can be killed out with less difficulty. The stalks are used by Coopers to put between the staves in their casks, and the fiber of the flower or cat-tail has been gathered for mattresses and pillows.
THE TULE AND ITS USES.
The tule is a remarkable vegetable. It may at some future day assume an importance far beyond the imagination of the present time. Civilization has as yet found but few uses for it. The Indians used the reeds to make large hampers, baskets and mats. The roots were used for bread. The squaws cut off the outer rind and retained only the inner or sweet part. This they cut into small pieces and placed in the sun until dried. This they ground in their stone mortars very fine and mixed it with grass or wild dock meal. The dough so prepared, was rolled into small loaves, which were placed in the asbes and baked, and made a palatable bread.
We believe the tule is now used to a considerable extent in making a sort of carpet-lining. It is used as a shield or pro- tection for bottles wben packed in cases.
NATIVE FLOWERING PLANTS.
It is almost humiliating to observe that until a plant takes its place as a simple, a medicine, or a poison, or is found to con- tribute in some way to our daily necessities, it is passed over in ignorance by generation after generation of careless folk. People are either too busy or too idle to name the inseets and
1
219
BOTANICAL FEATURES OF THE COUNTY.
flowers. It is found sufficient to the country folk to eall them weeds; and admiring ladies in their summer jaunts are satis- fied with such designations as " that yellow thing," or the other " purple thing."
The herbaceous flowering plants are so numerous that we can only speak briefly of the members of a few families.
Of a very extensive flower-bearing class, noted for flowers only, a few characteristic species will be named. This is the larger division of the botanic field common to the county and valley, and to the botanist by far the most attractive. The expert, however, would call the attention of any one seeking the general character of the plant-life of the region to the dis- tinguishing forms. Such forms are pretty well agreed upon.
The buttercups are represented by the Rununculus Califor- nicus, which, during the whole year, may be seen with its yel- low flowers, in moist, grassy places.
Conspicuous along the shaded streams and moist hill-sides are several species of the " Monkey Flower," Minulus Douglasii, M. lutens, M. moschatus (the musk plant), and on dry grassy hills, the M. glutinosus. With the latter, and about moist elit's, the Collinsia bicolor grows. This has a beautiful flower, and is often cultivated. It has a large salmon-colored cup, blooming in great profusion on a low, sticky, ragged-looking plant, aud tbe other about as large, but of a soft golden yellow, with reddish spots on one lip. The last grows always in low, wet, sunny places, bas a weak stem and coarsish leaf. You always stop to pick and admire the golden velvet cups of this " yellow thing." It is the golden monkey flower.
There are four species of beautiful violets, three in the woods and one in the fields.
Two species of "Spring Beauty," Claytonia, are found in abundance. Also, a beautiful mallow, flowering early in spring in the fields, quite attractive, and among the first spring flowers.
The lupines are numerous and nearly all handsome. About ten species of the forty to fifty belong to California. We have also a large proportion of the clovers-ten out of the twenty- six being eredited to California. Many of them are showy and singular in shape, besides they furnish good forage for horses and cattle. We cannot say as mueh for the lupines. Wild peas abound and cattle become fat on them in the mountain ranges.
Two wild roses, one in the woods and the other on the open lands, are found. They are both very fragrant, both beautiful, but not as showy as cultivated roses.
Evening primroses, two or three members of the family, are well worth cultivation; especially Zauschneria, Clarkiu, one or two species of Enotheia and Godetia.
The Poppy family is represented by three or four beautiful species, worthy of cultivation, the Eschscholtzia and two species of Platistigma being among them. "This beautiful orange poppy, which an old Russian bear of a botanist has stretched on the raek of the name Eschscholtzia, but which long ago some poetic Spaniard, neither a flower 'sharp' nor a botanist, taking a hint from nature, as men were modest enough to do in his time, christened El copo de oro (the cup of gold). Every sueh tract where the sumptuous blossoms stand thick, reminds one of the 'Field of the Cloth of Gold.' They are peculiarly joy- ous looking flowers, massed together, dancing and hobnobbing,
and lifting their golden goblets to be filled by the morning sun."
Milk weed (asclepias) is often the only green plant to be seen in the fall on the desert wastes of the plains. It grows three or four feet high.
Every child must stop to gather the bright scarlet flower they call Indian pink. Its love of stone heaps, its sticky stew, and its fiery, fringed petals, easily deseribe this favorite wild flower. But for very good scientific reasons it ought not to be ealled a pink; and its stickiness has earned it the name of the old wine-god's attendant, the untidy Silenus who flourished before an age of pocket-handkerchiefs. So the Greeks ealled this plant Silene, and so should we. The English call it catch- fly; but so they miss the classic story and do not improve the name.
There is another conspieuous scarlet blossom, much more common, that is known by the same name. It will be rec- ognized as a brushy-looking tuft of flame-colored flowers, seen on all open, sunny hills and borders of woods until late in the summer. Painter's-brush, it was called by early travelers through the far West, and very well named, for it looks like a brush that has been dipped in scarlet. In England, where it blossoms in a few wet meadows, it is called Painted-eup. It has received in botauy a pretty Spanish name, Castilleia, and to reconeile all differences, it should be called so.
Everywhere, both in sheltered and open places, is a rich yellow daisy-like flower with finely cut, pale green leaves, like Chrysanthemum leaves. Yellow daisy, they call it, but it is more like the Coreopsis, and for want of a better popular name let it be called so. Daisies have leaves growing on tbe ground, and this unusually pretty flower does not.
All our roadsides, and those fields left to a volunteer crop, are adorned with the beautiful azure lilies that hold on patiently through several months of dry weather. They are lilies in a strict sense, waving long wax-like eups among the yellow grasses. Let them not be called blue-bells. A blue- bell hangs with its mouth downwards, and these blue lillies stand upright.
The number of plants is so great that to make a full cata- logue of them would only be of interest to the professional botanist.
Of wild flowers there are a great variety and abundance in California, and they have their different seasons for blooming; and in cañons where the soil is always moist, flowers may be seen in every month of the year. In the spring-time the hills are frequently covered with them, and their red, blue, or yellow petals hide everything else. Each month has its flowers. In March the grass of a valley may be hidden under red, in April under blue, and in May under yellow blossoms.
THE FLORA A TEST OF CLIMATE.
Aside from rain-gauges, hygrometers, thermometers, and sueh things, all useful in their way, and helps to a correct knowledge of climate, we have a single and more eertain test. It ean be read and applied at a glance. It is the flora of a country. If we know the plants, we may be able to deseribe the elimate. The botany of the region tells, with peculiar emphasis, the qualities of the climate.
220
HISTORY OF MERCED COUNTY.
BEAUTIFUL FLORAL SCENE,
In March or April, in May or June, whenever we choose to look, there is a glow of bright colors on fields and hill-sides. The air is perfumed with a pleasant fragrance. There is such a profusion of flowers that we cannot count them. The lupine, the orthocarpus, grindelia, wyethia, erithichium, bæria, and malvastrum, and others too numerous, but not unworthy, to mention, mingle their colors and fragrance, and we stand enchanted in a field of beauty. Botanical names and terms are but luggage to worry and perplex. We forget it all, and only feel and know the charm that surrounds us.
Grace Greenwood, writing in May, said: "The grand Cali- fornia flower-show is at its height. Anything more gorgeously beautiful than the display in meadows and wild pasture lands, on hill-side and river-side, it were impossible for any one but a mad florist to imagine. Along the railroads on either liand runs continuously the rieli, radiant bloom. Your sight becomes pained, your very brain bewildered, by watching the galloping rainbow. There are great fields in which flowers of many sorts are mingled in a perfeet carnival of color; then come exclusive family gatherings, where the blues, the erimsons, or the purples, have it all their own way; and every now and then you come upon great traets resplendent with the mnost royally gorgeous of wild flowers."
If we go to the woods in the summer-time, after the fields begin to brown with age and ripeness, and find some shady brook passing under the alders, the bay trees, the pines, and the oaks, we shall enjoy the scene with no less fervor. Here are the ferns, a numerous family, the wood mosses, and the liehens. Here lilies, saxifrages, equisetae, oreliids, sedges, holy- grass, and liverworts. The birds serenade us from the tree- tops, and the brook sings a soug of content as it goes joyfully towards the sea. We will not try to entice the trout from their native element, because they. are more beautiful there than in our fish basket. Let us fill the latter with treasures of the floral kingdom, for our home decorations.
With the first rains, usually in October, plant life starts anew, or, rather, the old are refreshed, and flower buds, cheeked by the dry weather, burst and come into bloom. Grass springs up from a long summer sleep, for not until the first of Febru- ary can we say that spring really begins. Then the new buds begin to swell and open with the warm days and the bountiful rains that have fallen.
These rains may come in Deecmber, January, or February; and until they do come, the earth, in the distriets not covered with timber, is brown. The grass continues green until June, when it begins to dry up aud turn yellow and brown, which colors then predominate in the landscape until the rains come again. The death of the grass, except at high elevations, is caused, not by the cold, but by the drought; and in those months when the praries of Indiana and Illinois are covered with snow,
the valleys of California are dressed in the brilliant green of young grass.
REGION ADAPTED TO SEMI-TROPICAL PLANTS,
Not the least important part of the subjeet is the adapta- bility of the San Joaquin Valley for the introduction and suc- eessful cultivation of semi-tropical plants. The orange has been grown for years in various places in the valley, but it was not till recently that attention has been attracted toward maturing the fruit for use. Reecnt trials show that the eulti- vation of the orange and lemon may become a souree of profit to hortieulturists. For domestic use large quantities of figs are yearly gathered, and it is found that the trees are among the most valuable ornamental shade trees grown, The almond does well anywhere inside tbc snow line. It is found, too, that all the finer varieties of French and German grapes grow readily and mature a large and profitable fruitage, and the manufacture of vast quantities of fine wines and raisins is only a question of time.
There remain some useful plants to be experimented with. It is elaimed that cotton and sugar-cane ean be cultivated profitably here. It is yet to be shown just what can be done. Cotton cultivation is treated in a separate article.
The olive appears to stand the climate well, and other small sub-tropical and tropical fruits have been cultivated to fruit- .bearing, with good prospects in favor of more extensive success.
GRAPES AND VINEYARDS,
The industry of raising grapes for wine or other uses has not been entered into to any great extent in Mcreed County, but all who have tried the raising of grapes have met with snecess. Through the mountainous region runs a thermal belt, withiu wbich frost is seldom seen, even in the coldest seasons. As a consequence of the mild elimate witbin the limit mentioned, strawberries bloom and ripen in large quantities in the open air at all seasons of the year; orange trees wear a perpetual livery of golden fruit and blossoms, and tbe delieate almond dons its fragrant dress of blossoms in February, when other sections of the country are hibernating, waiting for the spring.
On the advent of the Americans, fruit of any kind, and espe- cially grapes, brought fabulous prices, indueing many from the innate love of the occupation, others carried by the moncy point, to bend all their energies, supported by capital, untiring industry and perseveranee, to obtain from foreign countries the ehoieest and best varieties, and aeelimate them in our midst. Uufortunately, the majority of trees thus obtained at exorbitant prices proved worthless, as not true to name, or not suited to the climate, or not satisfactory to public taste; many were planted in improper locations, some dried up, and more were killed by irrigation or overflows.
221
ZOOLOGY OF MERCED COUNTY.
ZOOLOGY OF MERCED COUNTY.
List of wild Animals; Bear, Elk, Deer, and Others; Their Numbers, Disappear- ance, and What became of Them.
THE number of wild animals that roamed on the plains, the foot-hills and the mountains, before the aggressive power of civilization eneroached upon them, was very great. The griz- zly bear was the monarch of the forest and jungle. There were great numbers of them in all the hends of the rivers in the mountains and foot-hills. Elk were also here in great numbers; but they were about the first to take fright at civilization and leave. They were mercilessly slaughtered by bunters-killed, not for their flesh, but for the fun of killing.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.