In the earliest days of farming in the Salinas Valley, wheat and barley dominated the landscape. As the agricultural industry unfolded, grains were replaced by potatoes, beans, sugar beets, and lettuce, which made its first appearance in the fields in 1916.
As row crops became the agricultural norm, farmers planted onions, cauliflower, tomatoes, cabbage, carrots, green peas, spinach, fennel, artichokes and strawberries. In the southern part of the Salinas Valley, for awhile in the early 1900s, orchards of walnuts, almonds, apricots, apples and pears dotted the valley floor.
Today, at any given time of the year, the Valley continues to be filled with a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Leaf lettuce tops the list and many of the fields throughout the year are planted with different lettuce varieties – Romaine, Spring Mix, red and green leaf, iceberg.
About 80 percent of the nation’s strawberries come from California. The low growing plants with red heart-shaped fruit are our world-renowned strawberries.
PLEASE NOTE: Stopping and looking at the fields or taking pictures is allowed. Please do not walk into the fields or pick anything … that is absolutely forbidden because of food safety concerns.
What’s Behind the Name
In its heyday, the Cominos Hotel* in downtown Salinas was the gathering spot for city leaders. It was owned by the Cominos Brothers, George and Mike, who renovated the old Abbott House Hotel which had been, from its earliest beginnings, the heart of that community.
We can only imagine what city leaders talked about as they gathered at the hotel for meetings and meals, the brothers part of the conversations taking place. They are credited with naming the Salinas Valley the “Salad Bowl of the World,” so we can make an educated guess that much of the talk was about agriculture.
*The Cominos Hotel was destroyed by the Loma Prieta earthquake.
