Will It Pay?

In entering upon any business the first question asked is, "will it pay?" A few men enter a business for the pure love of the thing itself, but the majority always have and always will look at any enterprise from an investment stand point. The time never has been in Southern California when there have not been found plenty of people who have advised against planting orange and lemon orchards, on the ground that the business will soon be overdone, and that the undertaking, as an investment, would be a failure. In this business, as in any other, there are plenty of failures; there is a right way and a wrong way to put out an orange orchard, and a majority of people find the wrong way.

As an evidence of what can be done we refer to the Sierra Madra Villa orchard, in this county. It was planted in the Spring of 1875, the trees were five-year-old roots, with two-year-old Konah grafts, making the trees, last Spring, eight years of age. Two hundred and fifty Konah trees were planted. This season J. De Barth Shorb has advanced $600 on the orange crop, and says that the trees will average 500 oranges to the tree. As $150 per acre will bring an orchard to this state of advancement, any ordinary scholar can easily figure on the proposition—"will it pay to plant orange orchards?" In our opinion it will pay to invest in an orange or lemon orchard, if the orchard is to receive good culture, otherwise not.'

Corn has sold in large quantities, in Iowa the present season, as low as eight cents per bushel.