By F. W. READ1 and S. S. ROGERS. Sacramento, California.

Celery has been produced commercially in California for some thirty Early experimental plantings were first made in the vicinity of San Francisco Bay but the first real commercial production was in Orange County in the southern part of the state, in the early nineties. It has been stated that Mr. D. E. Smeltzer, who had come to California after an unsuccessful attempt to grow celery in Florida, was the first to see the possibilities of the industry in California and through his efforts the country between the Santa Ana River and Huntington Beach was drained and found to be exceptionally well adapted to the production of celery. For a considerable period of time, this district was the only celery-producing section of California. As early as 1899, it was estimated that some 1825 car loads were shipped out of the state. From 1908 to 1915, the average annual production in California was approximately 2500 cars and the calendar year production now averages anywhere from 2500 to 3500 cars, depending upon the

season.

Up to a few years ago, the southern California districts centering in Los Angeles and Orange counties, were the principal producing sections of the state. At the present time, however, the center of production has shifted to the Sacramento and San Joaquin River delta sections in Contra Costa, San Joaquin and Sacramento counties, owing for the most part to the increasing losses from blight and continuous heavy croppings in the southern districts.

Figure 2 illustrates graphically the celery-producing sections of California. Most of the celery now produced in southern California. is grown in relatively small acreages in what is known as the El Monte district in Los Angeles County and on the lands adjacent to the city of Santa Ana in Orange County. A limited amount of so-called "summer celery" is produced around Venice in Los Angeles County and seems to be growing increasingly popular.

The principal shipping stations in northern California, as will be seen from Table 4, are, Antioch, Walnut Grove, Stockton and Sacramento. The Chula Vista district in San Diego County produces a high-grade product and is growing in importance as is the section. around Watsonville in Santa Cruz County.

While celery is shipped from California in limited quantities practically every month in the year, the main harvesting and shipping season is from the middle of October to the end of March. The vast majority of the shipments, however, are moved out of the state during November, December and January, as will be noted from figure 3.

'Resigned Feb. 1, 1923.

Bureau of Standardization, California Department of Agriculture.

3Considerable of the historical data used in this introduction was assembled by H. H. Warner in 1919 when connected with the Bureau of Markets, United States Department of Agriculture.