34 NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



NEGLECTED NATIVE FRUITS. 



PETEE YOUNGERS, JR. 



Nebraska is blessed with a wonderful amount and remarkable vari- 

 ety of native fruits. By far the greater number of our counties are 

 practically treeless, yet every stream, no matter how small, and even 

 the breaks that head the formation of the streams, abound with native 

 fruits. 



Among the best, and at the same time most neglected, is the black- 

 cap raspberry. This berry covers the entire state, and there is 

 no fruit that will yield better returns to the intelligent horticulturist 

 than the black raspberry. In the spring of 1876 we dug 700 plants 

 from the banks of Turkey creek and transplanted them in rows. We 

 gave them very high cultivation, and we have never planted any other 

 small fruit that gave us as good returns for the amount invested. I 

 believe there were at least thirty varieties in the lot that would prove 

 remunerative to the propagator, and but a very small percentage of 

 the fruit was unsatisfactory. Again, in 1878, we dug 1,600 more 

 plants from the same source, and the same results were obtained — good, 

 large berries, hardy bushes, and abundant bearers. If these results 

 can be obtained by simply transplanting wild bushes from their native 

 state to the garden, may it not be possible that we have in them the 

 foundation for a black-cap raspberry that will surpass anything we are 

 now propagating for Nebraska? It seems to me that by a judicious 

 selection ot some of the very best of these wild plants a berry might 

 be produced which would meet with all the requirements of our cli- 

 mate, and while the fruit might not be quite so good in quality as 

 some of the tame sorts, yet this would be more than counterbalanced 

 by the hardiness and productiveness of the plants. 



The wild black currant is another of Nebraska's neglected fruits. 

 They abound in the western part of the state in many distinct varie- 

 ties, and if properly selected they will prove an acquisition to the list 

 of fruits we now cultivate. In fact, they have already been quite 

 largely sold by nurserymen, the Crandall currant being of the wild 



