THE PLUMS OF NEW YORK. 377 



Wickson is one of the best known of Burl)ank's many plums. The 

 variety was first described in the repori; of the Secretary of Agriculture 

 in 1892 under the name Perfection and as a seedling of Kelsey crossed 

 by Burbank. In 1893 ^"d 1894 Burbank offered for sale the control and 

 the stock of this variety but fotmd no buyers and in 1895 introduced it 

 himself. The parentage of the variety is in doubt. Burbank considered 

 it a Kelsey-Burbank cross ; the Pacific Rural Press described it as offspring 

 of Kelsey and Satsuma; Bailey, Waugh and the workers at this Station 

 believe it to have Prunus simonii characters. The foliage, flowers, the 

 tree, the fniiting habit, the texttire of the flesh, all indicate Simon as 

 one of its parents. According to the report of the Secretary of the Cali- 

 fornia State Board of Horticulture shipments of this plum were made to 

 New York in the season of 1897 under the name of Eureka. In 1899 it 

 was placed on the fn.;it catalog list of the American Pomological Society. 



Tree medium to large, vigorous, with narrow, upright head, dense-topped, tender 

 to cold, an uncertain bearer; branches medium in smoothness, the fruit-spurs numerous, 

 dark ash-gray with tinge of brown, with lenticels of medium size; branchlets thick and 

 long, with short intemodes, greenish-red changing to light chocolate-brown, glossy, 

 glabrous; lenticels numerous, raised, variable in size; leaf-buds small, short, obtuse, free. 



Leaves folded upward, lanceolate or oblanceolate, one inch wide, three inches long, 

 thin; upper surface dark green, glossy, glabrous, with a slightly grooved midrib; lower 

 surface pale green, glabrous, except along the midrib; apex taper-pointed, base cuneate, 

 margin finely serrate, with reddish glands; petiole three-eighths inch long, lightly 

 pubescent along one side, faintly tinged red, glandless or with from one to nine small, 

 reniform, greenish or yellow glands variable in position. 



Blooming season early and of medium length; flowers appearing after the leaves, 

 intermediate in size, white; borne in clusters on lateral spurs, in pairs or in threes; 

 pedicels of medium length and thickness, glabrous, greenish; calyx-tube green, obconic, 

 glabrous; calyx-lobes acute, erect, glandular-ciliate; petals oval, entire, short-clawed; 

 anthers yellowish; filaments below medium in length; pistil glabrous, longer than 

 the stamens. 



Fruit early mid-season, period of ripening long; variable in size, the larger fruits 

 about two and one-eighth inches in diameter, obliquely cordate, halves unequal ; cavity 

 deep, abrupt, with yellowish concentric rings; suture often prominent and deep, with a 

 prolonged tip at the apex; color dark red over a yellow ground, indistinctly splashed with 

 darker red, mottled with thin bloom; dots numerous, small, yellow, inconspicuous, densely 

 clustered about the apex; stem thick, eleven-sixteenths inch long, glabrous; skin thin, 

 tender, separating easily; flesh amber-yellow, juicy, coarse, somewhat fibrous, firm, 

 sweet, pleasant but not high in flavor; good; stone clinging, one inch by five-eighths 

 inch in size, oval or ovate, pointed, with pitted surfaces; ventral suture winged; dorsal 

 suture grooved. 



