Raisins may be produced by cheaper methods than those which I advocate, but only great care, judgment and study will accomplish the best results. In the raisin industry it pays to produce the best, and to attain this very little extra care is required. _Time of Ripening._--Varying with different localities and seasons, the Muscat grape ripens in California between the 10th of August and the 30th of September. The earliest points where raisin grapes are now grown are probably Palm Valley in San Bernardino county and the plains of Kern county. In both these localities Muscats have been known to be ripe as early as July, but neither locality has yet produced any great quantity of raisins, and can hardly be considered as a raisin center. The earliness of the San Joaquin valley generally is probably caused by its small elevation above the sea, which is about three hundred feet for Fresno, and increasing as we go farther south. San Bernardino county again, somewhat later as to ripening, is, as far as its raisin centers are concerned, more elevated, or from one thousand to two thousand feet or more. The nearness to the sea has there also some influence to retard the maturing of the grapes, and it is certain that in Southern California the later ripening of the raisin grapes is principally due to this cause. Thus the picking in Riverside commences between the 10th and the 30th of September, and while the other raisin districts in the southern part of California may vary some, still the ripening season coincides very nearly with that of Riverside. In Highlands the grapes are said to ripen two weeks later than at Riverside. In El Cajon the grapes ripen between the 1st and 10th of September. In Fresno the Muscatel raisin grapes ripen in the end of August, and generally by the 20th of August the picking has begun everywhere on the drier soils, while on the wet soils it is generally retarded from one to two weeks. As a rule the dryness of the soil influences considerably the ripening of the grapes, and even the quality of the soil is not without some influence, as on sandy, warm soil grapes ripen much earlier than on heavy land. As an illustration of such early ripening, we may mention that, on certain gravelly soils northwest or north of Santa Ana, the Muscat grapes ripen two weeks earlier than on the heavier and finer soils in the immediate vicinity. The growers take advantage of this early ripening to sell their Muscat grapes fresh instead of drying them.