THE OLIVE industry promises to be one of the most prosperous branches of horticulture in California. The southern counties were at first thought to be peculiarly adapted to the olive, as to the orange, but later experience has very greatly extended the region of successful olive-culture, and trees are being planted, this season, on cheap mountain lands three hundred miles north of San Francisco.

Perhaps too much has been written in California publications about the profits of the olive, and far too little about its food value for home consumption. It is the poor man's tree, at home on rocky hillsides. The Californian laborer of the next century must live somewhat as the Italian peasant does, upon olive oil, grapes and bread, rather than upon butter and meats. The present condition of the olive industry can be briefly stated. For five years past, every tree that the nurserymen could possibly produce has been sold. Orchards are now planted in at least 30 of the 53 counties of the state. Several prominent growers have gone to Europe to study the choice varieties of the olive. Five or six books on the olive have been published in San Francisco. One of the best of these is Adolph Flamant's "Treatise on Olive Culture;" another is by A. T. Marvin, of the Quito Olive Farm. At least a dozen magazine articles on the olive have appeared in various publications. The reports of the State University, and the Horticultural Board, contain not less than twenty papers and discussions of value to olive growers.

The literature of the daily newspaper on the subject is, as usual, somewhat haphazard and misleading, because seldom written by practical olive growers.

The pioneer of the olive industry is Elwood Cooper, of Santa Barbara, a man of great energy and persistence. Mr. Lelong, head secretary of Horticultural Board, has done much to develop public interest in the olive. W. B. West, of Stockton, the nurseryman to whom, more than any other man, the Californians owe the beginnings of fig culture, was also one of the pioneers in studying the olive abroad, and importing the best varieties. John Rock, the veteran nurseryman, formerly of San Jose", now of Niles, is probably the leading spirit of the present time in the practical development of the industry. He does not write about the olive, but he has made two journeys to France, Spain and Italy within the past five years, and, like W. B. West, he knows exactly what to look for, and where to find it. Another of the names forever linked with the early history of olive culture here, is that of the late B. B. Redding. He was chief of the Land Department of the Central Pacific railroad, and devoted much of his leisure to horticultural investigations. He made large importations and planted extensively. In 1878 he published a paper on olive culture.

The late Dr. Bleasdale, an old priest, whose knowledge of the Spanish, Italian, French and Portuguese literature on the subject was something wonderful, published many papers on the olive, and finally, in 1881, a book.

A Typical Bit of Olive-producing Country in Southern California, Olive trees at the right and in the back-ground.

Elwood Cooper's notable work appeared in 1882, was republished in 1887, and supplemented by other papers in 1888 and 1889. F. Pohndorf's olive book appeared in 1884, aad B. M. Lelong's in 1888. Two of the best of recent publications have been papers by northern Californians, one by S. S. Boynton, of Oroville, in the Overland Monthly for July, 1889, another by Mr. Gray, of Chico, which was printed in the state horticultural reports.

Nearly all the olive trees that have yet come into bearing are of the old Mission variety, brought to the coast by Spanish priests more than a century ago. It is a very valuable sort, identified as belonging to the Cornicabra-Cornizuelo group of Spanish olives, and is excellent both for pickles and for oil. It ripens late in the season, is a shy bearer in some localities, and its propagation is somewhat difficult, but even with these drawbacks, it will long be the leading olive of California. An olive of small size, introduced by B. B. Redding, and called the Redding Picholine, is found to propagate so readily that it is used extensively as the stock upon which to bud or graft the finer sorts. The Picholine is often called here the Oblonga. The Pendoulier, Manzanillo, Rubra, Uvaria, Columella, Lucques, Macrocarpa, Oliviere, Saillern, and several other varieties are described, and the localities given where they have already fruited, by E. J. Wickson, in his work on "California Fruits".

For years the oil of Santa Barbara and San Diego was justly esteemed as the finest, but the younger orchards are gaining rank, and during the last two years an oil equal to the best has been produced in Santa Clara Mission, San Jose, Liver-more, Napa, Sonoma, Butte and other parts of the state.

The Saillern Olive.

The olive requires, so writers say, 7,160 degrees of heat from the time the tree blossoms till the frosts come. At Oroville, Butte county, the average degrees of heat between April and November gives a total of 13,740. The slopes of the Sierras and coast range, as far north as Trinity and central Shasta, are warm enough for at least the early ripening sorts of olive. A little snow for a few days during winter does not injure the tree. In Butte, Tehama, Placer, Yuba and Nevada, all northern Sierra counties, there are now large olive orchards just coming into bearing. Some are on sandy bottom soils; others are on thin red lands, over hard pan, and still others are over limestone, slate, granite, or sandstone rock overlaid with a few inches of light warm soil.

Elwood Cooper, of Santa Barbara, reports an average yield of two gallons of olives from each of his four-year-old trees, and a few of his six-year-olds have even born thirty gallons. Mr. Flamant, of Napa, expects from six to ten gallons from six-year-old trees, worth for pickles one dollar a gallon, which nets him about five dollars a tree, after allowing for cost of picking. There can be no doubt whatever of the earlier bearing of the olive in California than across the Atlantic, as evidence on this point is overwhelming. The eight-year-old California tree yields more than the fifteen-year-old tree in Europe. Some of the old Mission olive trees have yielded one hundred and fifty gallons of berries apiece. Oil pays better than pickling. Elwood Cooper reports sales at from $1,000 to $2,000 per acre, and he thinks these prices will continue. There is an enormous and a still increasing demand for pure olive oil. After making every possible discount for lower prices, the olive is still the most profitable crop that the horticulture of California has tested.

Its culture requires capital, patience and skill, but the rewards are commensurate, and greater than for other fruits.

The Picholine Olive.

All the writers whose books I have mentioned, unite in predicting a future for the olive in this state, beyond that of almond, fig, walnut, orange, lemon, or grape. In five years more, the trees now planted will attract attention, and begin to produce an effect upon the American markets. In Butte county alone there were 54,600 olive trees planted in 1887-88 and 1888-89. This winter in that county 30,000 more trees will be planted. There are no reports which give the exact acreage in olives in the state, but it cannot be far from 16,000 acres, representing a million and a half trees.

The best pickled olives of California are, as yet, seldem in market. They are an essentially home product, made from a few trees in the garden, and used on the owner's table. The typical California five-acre homestead has a dozen olive trees, whose fruit is pickled, not green, but when nearly ripe, and used as daily food. Mission olives, properly treated, make a pickle far superior to any imported olive. Some of the new varieties will be even better for the home supply. But with oil making, the orchard ought to be large, and even then it would be best to sell the olives to the oil mills, unless the same skill and judgment that go to the making of fine wines can be obtained.

The olive trees that still stand about the mission gardens rank among the most picturesque memo-rials of the last century. I have seen a great many of them, sometimes alone, sometimes grouped with oranges and palms. At the old San Diego Mission they stand in long avenues on the river bottom below the ruined adobes - grand trees, a hundred and twenty years old, wasted by fire and axe, but wonderfully fruitful, and noble in their neglected disarray. The old olive avenue behind the church at the Mission San Jose, in Alameda county, some 35 miles from San Francisco, marks another of the famous priest-gardens of the past. In this old grove there are several varieties of olive, some of which ripen much earlier than others. Olives were planted by Spaniards in many other places. Old trees often stood on the larger ranches. I remember seeing olives beside the broken walls of lonely adobes on some of the famous ranches of Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo - olives as enduring as the live oaks, standing in the midst of wide, untilled pastures, to mark the fallen homestead of some Spanish gentleman.

If a group of capitalists were looking for a safe and permanent investment, they could find nothing better in California than the planting of a large olivarium or olive orchard. It ought to be cheap mountain land, costing not more than ten dollars an acre, planted with the best varieties, and carefully cultivated. With a practical manager, no better dividend-paying investment could be found in the United States.

California. Charles H. Shinn.