Pen pictures from the garden of the world, or Santa Clara county, California, Part 2

Author: Foote, Horace S., ed
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Chicago : The Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 844

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The evaporation from this body of water affected materially the climate of the adjacent regions. Low- ering, as it must have done, the general temper- ature and increasing the humidity, it induced pre- cipitation from the saturated winds of the Pacific, while from its own evaporation it added materially to the rainfall it thus invited. From these causes, the precipitation of that period, both as to volume and duration, must have been greatly in excess of the present, and vegetation must have been correspond-

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PEN PICTURES FROM THE "GARDEN OF THE WORLD."

ingly more luxuriant. From the slopes of the mount- ain ranges the waters flowed southerly in a majestic stream, forming broad lakes as the basin widened, a river where the narrowing valley restricted its borders, until, passing through the bay of San Francisco, and the present valleys of Santa Clara and Pajaro, it found an outlet in Monterey Bay.

In the era that measured the existence of this ancient river, it had borne in its turbid waters the disintegrations of the regions it traversed, and, in the ooze and slime of the lakes that intercepted its course and stilled its current, was the decaying mold of gen- erations of forests that had flourished on its banks. At a later geological period-probably the Quaternary -there was an upheaval of the southern part of this basin, its axis probably being near the present course of the Salinas River. With this rise came a depres- sion in the bay of San Francisco. The drainage was now to the north. The Coast Range was broken through at the Golden Gate, and the waters of the great basin found there their outlet to the sea; while the former lakes, uplifted and drained, were trans- formed into fertile plains. During the same period, the sea that lay to the east of the Sierras was cut off from the Pacific. The evaporation of this now land- locked basin was in excess of the rainfall, and gradu- ally these waters receded until, to-day, Salt Lake is the remnant of that inter-ocean which once extended through thirty degrees of latitude and from the Rocky Mountains to the Sierras.

This, the recent history of these regions, the geologi- cal records upon every hand fully attest-here by beds of water-worn pebbles, by strata of clay (always the deposit of quiet waters) that underlie the whole valley, by the trunks of trees that the drill of the well-borer discovers hundreds of feet beneath the surface, and by the vast deposit of vegetable mold that forms everywhere the surface soil of the valley; while to the east, mountains of marine shells and fossils, vast beds of salt, beach lines upon the slopes of the mountains, attest the existence of the sea that left these proofs of its presence and wrote with its fretful waves the story of its long companionship upon these rugged cliffs, and then shrank from them forever.

With the subsidence of this sea, there came that change in climate which now characterizes this coast. The vapors from the Pacific were now absorbed by the dry air of this region, and the precipitation which the sea had promoted, the desert now prevented. The classification of these seasons as wet and dry often misleads-for while the latter is all that the term im-

plies, the rainy season has as much of sunshine as of storm, as the records abundantly show. A brief epitome of these seasons and the attendant phenom- ena will be given :-

Beginning with the month of October, the signs of a coming change are apparent. The winds, no longer constant from one quarter, become variable both as to direction and force, or wholly cease. Sudden blasts raise miniature whirlwinds of dust and leaves, which troop over the fields, and the stillness of the night is broken by fitful gusts and the sudden wail of the trees as the breath of the coming winter sweeps through them. These are the recognized precursors of the season's change, and are usually followed, in the first ten days of October, by an inch or more of rain; and this, usually, by weeks of the finest weather. The effect of these first rains is magical. The dust is washed from the foliage and is laid in the roads and fields. The air has a fresh sparkle and life. The skies are a deeper azure, and the soft brown hills seem nearer and fairer than be- fore. It is the Indian summer of the East; but, instead of the soft lassitude of the dying year, here it comes with all the freshness and vigor of the new-born spring.

If, in this and the succeeding months, there are further showers, the grass springs up on every hand, and the self-sown grain in all the fields. The hills change their sober russet for a lively green. Wild flowers appear in every sheltered nook. Hyacinths and crocuses bloom in the gardens, and the perfume of the violet is everywhere in the air. In the latter part of November the rainy season is fully established. A coming storm is now heralded by a strong, steady wind, blowing for a day or two from the southeast, usually followed by several days of rain, and these succeeded by days or weeks without a cloud-and thus, alternating between occasional storms and fre- quent sunshine, is the weather from October to April -the rainy season of California. The amount of rain that falls varies materially with the locality. In San Jose it is from fifteen to twenty inches, while, in places not ten miles distant, twice that amount is recorded. During this period there are from thirty to forty days on which more or less rain falls; from fifty to seventy that are cloudy; the rest, bright and pleasant. These estimates will vary with particular seasons; but, tak- ing the average of a series of years, it will be found that from October to April one-half the days are cloudless, and fully three-fourths such that any out- door vocation can be carried on without discomfort or inconvenience.

PEN PICTURES FROM THE "GARDEN OF THE WORLD."

Cyclones and wind-storms are wholly unknown, and thunder is only heard at rare intervals, and then as a low rumble forty miles away in the mountains. With the month of March the rains are practically over, though showers are expected and hoped for in April. Between the first and tenth of May there usually falls from a half to three-fourths of an inch of rain. Coming as this does in the hay harvest, it is neither beneficial nor welcome. By the first of July the surface moisture is taken up and dissipated, and growth dependent upon this ceases. The grasses have ripened their seed, and, self-cured and dry, are the nutritious food of cattle and sheep. The fields of grain are yellow and ripe and wait but the reaper. Forest trees and shrubs have paused in their growth. This, to the vegetable world, is the season of rest.

This is the winter of the Santa Clara Valley-winter, but strangely unlike winter elsewhere, for here man "has interposed. Here, by art and by labor, he has reversed the processes of nature and constrained the course of the seasons. In gardens, bright with foliage and resplendent with flowers, there is spring in its freshness and beauty; while in orchards teeming with fruits, and vineyards purple with ripening grapes, summer and autumn vie for the supremacy. And so, with changing beauty and ceaseless fruition, pass the seasons of this favored clime. If in these seasons, the resident or the visitor finds but one succession of enjoyments, to the farmer and fruit grower they are of the utmost practical importance as well as con- venience. Those months that in the East preclude all farming operations, are here the season of most active industry and preparation. With the rains of November plowing and seeding begin and continue with but little interruption to the first of March. If the rains are continued too late in the spring, the later- sown fields are usually cleaner crops and of superior quality, while without these later rains, the earlier- sown is likely to be most successful. It is in the harvesting, however, that the advantages are most apparent-an advantage hardly understood elsewhere an I scarcely appreciated here.

Here the favored farmer gathers his matured crop with no possibility of rain interfering, and with no thought of the storms that elsewhere make this a season of severest toil and constant anxiety. His hay, as he cuts it, falls upon soil as dry as is the air above it, and is cured without further handling or labor than to collect it in cocks or stacks. The grain, matured and dry, waits without waste or detriment for weeks or months for the reaper, and in October,

and often far into November, the hay presses and threshers may be seen busy with the hay and grain that has remained in cocks or stacks for the past five months.

For the fruit grower, these seasons are even more favorable than to the farmer. To the visitor, the thousands of acres of orchard and vineyard without a weed or a blade of grass to be seen, would rep- resent an apparent amount of labor and culture abso- lutely appalling-and so it would be-not merely appalling, but quite impossible under the climatic con- ditions of other regions. In sections where frequent rains, constant humidity, come with the summer, the seeds of every form of weeds ripen with every week of sunshine and germinate with every shower. The surface moisture usually favors their continued growth and development, and the only possible conditions for successful tillage are those of constant warfare with weeds. Here the seeds near the surface germinate with the winter rains and are turned under and de- stroyed with the first plowing. The surface dries to a depth of three or four inches at the commencement of summer and so remains through the whole season. In this dry soil it is impossible for seeds to germinate or plants to live. Anyone who has ever attempted to start seeds in the summer knows how indispensable is constant moisture, and will readily understand how effectively this feature of the climate co-operates with the cultivator and preserves to trees and vines all of the moisture and nutrition that the soil contains.

The Californians' estimate of the climate of their State has been the theme of much facetious comment. In view of the fact that elsewhere those who are able, spend half the year on the St. Lawrence or the coast of Maine, to escape the heat of summer, and the other half in Cuba, Florida, or on the shores of the Medi- terranean, to avoid the rigors of winter; that, in fact, most of their lives are migrations in search of climate -the residents of this State may accept with equa- nimity the badinage of these birds of passage, and may well felicitate themselves upon those conditions that bring to their very door the summer of the Thousand Isles and the winter of the Antilles. That this is not an exaggeration is easily shown. Ther- mometrical records, however accurately kept, are quite apt to mislead those who seek to deduce from them practical results.

There are many important conditions not ex- pressed in these observations. It is well understood that from the dryness of the air, forty degrees below zero is more tolerable in Dakota than thirty degrees

PEN PICTURES FROM THE "GARDEN OF THE WORLD."

higher in the humid air of the Atlantic seaboard; and, for the same reason, and almost in the same ratio, as to heat. It would be but little consolation to a person to know that, some thousands of miles away, the temperature from which he was suffering would be quite endurable. So as to averages which usually form a conspicuous feature of these records. It is not from the averages, but from the extremes, that men suffer and vegetation dies. Nor do even the ex- tremes represent the effect-their continuance is im- portant. A plant often survives a severe frost and then succumbs to a much lighter repetition, and a degree of heat that may be endured for a day, be- comes intolerable when continued for several. In view of these well-recognized facts, I propose to present the question of temperature as shown by effects which are readily appreciated by all, rather than by compilations of figures thus liable to mislead. The rains of October are usually followed by frosts, sufficiently sharp, in the lowlands of the valley, to kill the more delicate plants. During the months of De- cember, January, and February these frosts are more frequent and severe. Every variety of grapes, figs, olives-in short, all the semi-tropic plants-remain unaffected by the frosts. Callas, fuchsias, geraniums, and heliotropes, when grown by the wall of a house, in the shade of an evergreen, or given the slightest covering, flourish and bloom through any winter, and, in many seasons, do so without any protection what- ever.

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Every known variety of rose flourishes without the least protection, and not only do they retain their leaves, but there is not a day in the winter when blossoms, hardly inferior to those of June, cannot be gathered in the open grounds of any garden. The lemon verbena shrub here attains a height of from ten to twenty feet, with a trunk from two to ten inches in diameter. Bees increase their stores during the rainy season, and every clear day humming-birds and butterflies appear in the gardens.

For personal comfort, fires are usually started in the morning, die down toward noon, and are rekindled for the evening. As little fire as can be kept burn- ing, usually suffices for comfort. There are days, stormy, damp, or cold, when more fire is required. Such days are the exception, however, and the rule is as stated.

Within the last twenty years snow has fallen in San Jose on three occasions. In no instance was it over three inches in depth. It disappeared before night-

fall of the day on which it fell, and its presence trans -. formed the usually staid city into a snow-balling carnival. In the dry season, beginning with April, the mornings are clear, calm, and not unpleasantly warm. About noon, a brisk breeze from the bay blows down the valley. This, harsh as it sweeps in through the Golden Gate, is soft and mild here. It goes down with the sun, and the night that follows is calm and cool. A high, light fog .sometimes hangs over the valley in the morning, but disappears by eight or nine o'clock. During the summer months, three or four heated terms may be expected. These are usually in periods of three days, and the ther- mometer indicates from ninety degrees to ninety-five degrees Fahrenheit. Upon the morning of the fourth day a fog generally appears, a cool breeze springs up, and the former temperature is restored and maintained for weeks before another heated term.

As these periods are the extreme of the season, some indicia will be given by which they may be under- stood and estimated. Through a part of these days, exposure to the sun is disagreeably hot, but not dangerously so. Under the shade of a tree or in the shelter of a well-constructed house, it is perfectly com- fortable. The evenings that follow are so cool that persons rarely sit upon the porches of their houses, and a pair of blankets is required for comfort while sleeping.

Summarizing, it may be said that, in any part of the year, days too hot or too cold for the comfort of those engaged in ordinary outdoor vocations are rare, and that a night uncomfortably warm is absolutely un- known. It may be added that the fears and fore- bodings with which the seasons are elsewhere greeted, are here unheard of; coming with no rigors, they bring no terrors, and are alike welcomed by all, not as a relief but as a change. In these conditions, health and personal comfort are largely subserved, and also in them the horticultural possibilities, of which we are to-day but upon the threshold, are assured; and these, the elements of present and of prospective prosperity, are as constant as the ocean currents in which they have their origin, as perma- nent as the mountain ranges which bound the field of their exhibition.

The county of Santa Clara has an area of rather more than a million of acres. Of this, about two hundred and fifty thousand acres is valley-the an- cient lake bed, or the alluvial deposits of existing streams-three hundred thousand acres is rolling hills and mountain slopes, well adapted to fruit; the

PEN PICTURES FROM THE "GARDEN OF TIIE WORLD."

residue valuable, principally for pasturage. While the general contour presented by the valley is that of a level plain, it is, in fact, a series of gentle undu- lations, with marked variations in the quality of the soil. In what is now, or has recently been, the lower portions of this plain, the soil is a black, tenacious clay, known as "adobe." It is very fertile and pro- ductive, but requires much care as to the time and manner of cultivating it, and is well adapted to hay and grain. The higher lands of the valley are a light, loamy, and sometimes gravelly soil. This is easily cultivated and is well adapted to all the cereals and to most varieties of fruit. In the vicinity of the bay there are many thousands of acres of salt marsh. No effort worthy the name has been made to reclaim them, though the task would seem a not difficult one. It is safe to predict that at no distant day these lands will be reclaimed and among the most productive and valuable in the county.

The "warm belt" is a tract upon the slopes of the hills that environ the valley. It has an altitude of from two hundred to eight hundred feet. It is gen- erally, and in some localities wholly, free from frost. In this belt, to the east of Milpitas, potatoes, peas, etc., are grown in the open air through the whole winter, for the San Francisco market. Upon the Los Gatos and Guadalupe Rivers are some hundreds of acres, formerly dense willow thickets, but now in the highest state of cultivation. These lands are regarded as the most desirable in the valley. The soil is a sedimentary deposit, easily cultivated, requiring but little irrigation, and producing every variety of fruit and vegetable. Thirty miles south of San Jose is the town of Gilroy. The soil of the valley is here fertile and productive. Over a considerable portion, the subterranean moisture maintains the growing pastures throughout the year, and some of the most successful dairies in the State are here established. The more elevated parts of the valley and the slopes of the hills are well adapted to fruits and vines. The summers of Gilroy are warmer and drier than in San Jose. The cool winds from the bay are materially softened as they sweep down the valley, and the differences of temperature between the day and night are not so marked. The air is mild and balmy, and the nights agreeably cool and pleasant.

The water courses within the county greatly di- minish, when they do not wholly disappear, in the sum- mer. Sinking, as they approach the valley, they augment the subterranean resources which supply the artesian wells. These are found all over the valley.

They are usually from sixty to one hundred feet in depth, though some find a larger and more permanent supply at a much greater depth. The water is raised by windmills into tanks, and is ample for household and gardening purposes. About Alviso and near the bay, hundreds of acres of strawberries and of vege- table gardens are irrigated from these wells, and the water rises to the surface with such force that the most massive appliances are required to restrain the flow.

Of the varied productions of this valley it is difficult to speak in terms which shall not savor of exagger- ation. The question is no longer what can, but what cannot, be successfully produced. With the early settlers cattle were the staple, and of the vast herds which roamed over the country, little more than the hides and tallow were utilized. The cereals, it was supposed, could only be grown in the summer, and where irrigation was afforded. The gold discovery changed all this. It furnished not only a market for the cattle, but, soon after, it was ascertained that the rainy months were the season of growth, and that wheat sown with the carly rains matured enormous crops of the finest quality. The success which at- tended this last industry relegated the cattle interest to the extensive and less valuable ranges eastward, while the prodigal quantity and superior quality of the wheat produced enabled it, not only to success- fully compete with all rivals in the markets of the world, but to fix for years the price of the bread of a hundred millions of people. As the herdsman had given way to the tiller of the soil, so the latter, and for the same reason, has made way for a more profit- able industry -- the growing of fruits. That this has not long since supplanted all other industries was not from any doubt as to production or quality, but simply as to transportation. This problem satisfactorily solved, and the fruit growers of this valley can have no successful rivals.

To-day, with this industry comparatively new, its means of transportation a monopoly, its markets but recently found, and its methods of reaching these markets an experiment -- with all these to contend against, the fruits of this valley are as well known and highly esteemed in the markets of the East and of the world as are those of Sicily, Asia Minor, and the Adriatic-where ages have been given to the in- dustry, where skilled labor is at the very lowest stage of compensation-and the ocean is the easy pathway to a world of consumers. The capacity of this valley in this direction is no new discovery. It is as old as

PEN PICTURES FROM THE "GARDEN OF THE WORLD."

its settlement. A hundred years ago the Mission Fathers introduced the grape which still bears their name and perpetuates their memory; and orchards of pear and olive, coeval with these vineyards, still bear abundantly, and attest alike the capacity of the re- gion and the judgment and forethought of those who thus demonstrated it, while the older records make frequent mention of planting and vintage, the fruits and the harvests of those ancient days. But neither record nor relics is needed to show the varied capacity of this region. The valley, upon every hand, is to-day exhibiting it. By the side of his fields sown to grain or in grass, the farmer plants an orchard or a vine- yard; between the rows of trees or of vines he tills and plants as before, and gathers full harvests of roots, etc., while waiting the fruition of his trees. His labors alternate between his fields of grain and of vines, and his teams are to-day transporting from his farm tons of hay for the market, and tons of grapes for the winery.

Nature, in everything prodigal, is in nothing invidi- ous, and were the fruit production to absolutely cease, the valley would remain one of the richest agri- cultural regions of the globe. I have referred to the wheat production, still successfully continued, except where supplanted by some more profitable product. Its hay crop is to-day the principal supply of the San Francisco market. In the vicinity of Santa Clara are fields of corn that never felt rain nor knew irrigation, and that will compare favorably with the crops of the valley of the Mississippi, while, besides this, whole farms are growing garden seeds, which have long commanded the highest prices in the Eastern markets. Extensive hop yards were established, and the vines grew and bore luxuriantly, and only the high price of labor prevented their being to-day a staple of the valley. Near Gilroy some of the most successful as well as extensive dairies in the State are established, while in the Santa Cruz Mountains, upon the west, petroleum is found, and its further development prose- cuted with every prospect of success. Of the fruit product of this county it is impossible to speak accu- rately-difficult to speak instructively. At the pres- ent writing, enormous canneries, employing thousands of laborers, are running night and day. Drying ap- paratuses on every hand, and in almost every field, are employed, while, in every direction, acres upon acres are covered with bags of fruit preserved by drying in the sun-every resource of labor or of mechanism is tasked to the utmost, and even the school

vacation is extended that the children may aid to preserve the enormous crop.

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The orchards in bearing are generally increasing in their yield and will continue so to do for many years, while extensive areas are coming into bearing and the planting of new orchards and vineyards is constantly going on. In fact, the system of summer culture which renders irrigation unnecessary, makes all the arable land in the county available for fruit. In view of these facts, estimates would be but the merest con- jecture. One thing may be said-that all the fruits of the temperate zone, and most of the semi-tropical fruits, are now grown in the greatest perfection and in quantities which tax to the utmost the resources and labor attainable to gather and preserve them. Orange trees have been grown for many years in this county (in San Jose more for ornament than for fruit), gener- ally seedlings, and with no care as to either selection or culture. In the vicinity of San Jose considerable groves have been growing for twenty years, produc- ing abundant crops of well-flavored fruit. The citrus fairs held last year (1887) in San Jose and other places, showed the very extensive sections where these fruits were being successfully grown; and this, with the stimulus of a market, has induced the planting of orange trees throughout the warm belt of this county. That these trees will grow, and luxuriantly, and that they are not affected by the frost, is estab- lished; and that certain varieties will mature excel- lent fruit, is certain. If, however, it shall be found wanting in the flavor or qualities of the oranges of Tahiti or Florida, it is because it does not have the long hot season-the burning days and sweltering nights-of those countries. I question whether it would be desirable to accept that climate, though with it we could secure this single production.

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Pen pictures from the garden of the world, or Santa Clara county, California, Part 2

Author: Foote, Horace S., ed Publication date: 1888 Publisher: Chicago : The Lewis Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 844

Author: Foote, Horace S., ed
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Chicago : The Lewis Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 844