ALSO APPENDIX TO THE ORGANIZATION AND WORK OF THE OREGON ISSUED BY AUTHORITY OF THE BOARD-SECOND EDITION. A. ANDERSON & CO., PRINTERS AND LITHOGRAPHERS. 1891. OFFICERS AND MEMBERS OF THE BOARD. J. R. CARDWELL, President JAMES A. VARNEY Commissioner for the State at Large. Inspector of Fruit Pests, Commissioner for the 4th District. R. S. WALLACE, Treasurer, Commissioner for the 2d District PORTLAND THE DALLES SALEM HENRY E. DOSCH, Commissioner for the 1st District J. D. WHITMAN, Commissioner for the 3d District...... HILLSDALE MEDFORD COVE E. W. ALLEN Secretary, 171 Second Street..... DISTRICT BOUNDARIES. PORTLAND FIRST DISTRICT. Multnomah, Clackamas, Yamhill, Washington, Columbia, Clatsop and Tillamook Counties. SECOND DISTRICT. Marion, Polk, Benton, Linn and Lane Counties, THIRD DISTRICT. Douglas, Jackson, Josephine, Coos, Curry and Lake Counties. FOURTH DISTRICT. Morrow, Wasco, Gilliam, Crook and Sherman Counties. FIFTH DISTRICT. Baker, Wallowa, Malheur, Grant and Harney Counties. REPORT. To the Honorable Senate and the House of Representatives of the Legislative Assembly of the State of Oregon. In accordance with "An act to create a State board of horticulture and appropriate money therefor," approved February 25, 1889, we, the State board of horticulture of the State of Oregon, under the provisions of the above act, respectfully submit for your consideration this, our report of the work done, and some of the results accomplished by this board since its organization, April 8, 1889, to the present time, December 31, 1890. A careful reading of this report should convince the most skeptical that the creation of this board was a wise act of the last legislature, and it can only be regretted that it could not have been done four, or at least two years sooner. This would have saved to the State and individual fruit growers thousands of dollars that must be now expended in exterminating insect pests from the orchards of Oregon that ought to have been kept free from them. Fruit growing in Oregon, which at present is comparatively small, will, at no distant day be one of her great commercial industries, and one which offers greater inducements to the person of moderate means than does any other industry within her boundaries. To look after this great interest by the enactment of wise laws and the appropriation of sufficient money to have them well executed, is certainly in the best interest of the people. Our fruit product, though not large, will this year aggregate in value to the State more than three-quarters of a million dollars, which, when we consider our limited population, and hitherto isolated position, commercially, is not insignificant. Of the five million acres of arable lands in the Willamette valley, two million acres may be called fruit lands, every way adapted to growing the finest fruits of the temperate zone. Southern Oregon is a great fruit country, now filling up with a prosperous fruit-growing population. Its extensive fruit lands are being largely set to orchards and vineyards, which are soon destined to yield of the finest fruits the sun ever shone upon an hundredfold, and become a source of wealth to its people and the State at large. Eastern Oregon-the Inland Empire-also has extensive areas of the finest fruit lands, now attracting attention, and so far as tested, of unsurpassed excellence, promising a great future for this industry in this section of the State. So are we not warranted in claiming a great fruitgrowing State? Our soil is productive, our climate propitious; our fruits have attracted favorable attention wherever exhibited, and at two world's fairs-Philadelphia and New Orleans, against fifty States and were Nations with fifty thousand plates of fruit, Oregon received the premium for the best five plates of hill-grown apples; also for the best five plates of valley-grown apples, and the judges reported that we entitled to the premium for the best sweepstake apple, but for the mistake of naming the plate Winesap instead of Roman Beauty, which it was; this mistake threw it out, and thus we lost the merited premium. Our prunes, plums and cherries have never failed to take premiums wherever exhibited. This season our board received at its office in Portland apples weighing from twenty-four ounces and upwards-one apple of Gloria Mundi variety weighing forty-four (44) ounces; cherries, the Royal Anns, measuring from three and a quarter to three and a half inches in circumference, and a seedling from J. H. Lambert, of Milwaukee, measuring from three and a half to three and three-quarters inches in circumference; peaches running from twelve to seventeen ounces, and of the best quality. These are preserved for exhibit at the World's Columbian exposition to be held at Chicago in 1893. Prunes weighing four ounces-dried product over an ounce-and this is not uncommon. Boston, owing to the large residence of wealthy European families, is the best fancy prune market in this country, and pays more for prunes and other fancy dried fruits than any other city. At the chamber of commerce in Boston this season, Mr. C. H. Ricker, residing near our neighboring town, Vancouver, exhibited the Italian prune as grown and dried on his place. The fruit attracted great attention. The best experts were called who know the prune as it is offered in the market of the world, and they pronounced this prune the equal, if not superior, to any they had seen. This sounds large, but is true, and will stand so in the markets of the world. The Royal Ann cherry-Napoleon Bigareau-as grown in Oregon, is without a rival; is of the largest size, averaging, commonly, nearly an inch in diameter, of superior quality, unsurpassed for shipping or canning, and makes a good dried product. The tree is vigorous and gives a regular and large yield, which brings the highest prices wherever offered. Our seedling, the Black Republican, has been well tested, and now has a national reputation; is large, of good quality, and a regular bearer of late fruit, which can be shipped across the continent. We have three other seedlings of great promise, which in size exceed all record, running from one to one and a third inches in diameter. Our Bartlett pears have always been in great demand. The tree yields regularly a heavy crop of the largest fruit of first quality, and has paid the grower a handsome dividend. This list might be extended. Perhaps enough has been said to indicate the fact that we have a fruit country. Reference to the report of Mr. J. A. Varney, inspector of fruit pests, will show that some of the worst pests of California and the Eastern States are widely distributed over the State; which it may be pertinent to remark, was not generally known until the work of this board disclosed the fact. Many of our best orchardists and nurserymen, long residents and enjoying an immunity from all insect ravages, had not discovered the insiduous and threatening depredations of the little strangers -the San Jose scale, the codlin moth, wooly aphis, green aphis and borers. These are all here, and whilst yet in their incipiency and easy of control, if neglected, will certainly prove expensive and disastrous enemies to this interest. The spraying pump and most approved remedies have also been widely distributed, and cheerfully adopted by our enterprising growers. It has been found easy to bring the most perverse opponent into line by showing that the expenditure of a nickel in spraying returned dollars in fruits. The board, have, as a board and as commissioners, visited hundreds of orchards throughout the State; and we are pleased to say, found the people in hearty accord and active sympathy with the work of this commission. The board has written hundreds of letters and distributed more than twenty thousand bulletins, and to all growers as far as we know. The board has been in correspondence with many State horticultural societies, with the pomological department at Washington, and the State board of horticulture of California, and take pleasure in publicly acknowledging the receipt of many valuable publications and material aid from these sources. To B. M. Lelong, secretary of the State board of California, and to H. E. Van Deman, head of the pomological department, Washington, and to Prof. C. V. Riley, the head of the department of Entomology, we acknowledge a hearty co-operation and special favors. The act creating this board we have found as a whole, after nearly two years' experience, to be well adapted for the accomplishment of the work sought. In some particulars we believe that the hands of the commission can be strengthened and the work be made more thorough and effective by the adoption of the amendments and additions herewith accompanying this report, and we most respectfully call the attention of your honorable body to the urgent necessity of their adoption as a part of the law. The board has endeavored to use the strictest economy in the use of the funds appropriated, and as will be seen in the secretary's report, have paid themselves much less than the law allowed when on duty as inspectors, and the secretary less than one-half of the amount allowed by the law; and thus we have been able to make the funds accomplish the largest possible results. We must respectfully submit that the sum named in the act creating this board is smaller than might be profitably used in the two years to come, and yet we have been impelled to name this amount, realizing that your honorable body would have to pass on many other worthy and urgent claims requiring the fostering care of the State. E. W. Allen, Secretary. Very respectfully submitted, J. R. CARDWELL, President. |