346 



The Journal of Heredity 



skies of England in the conservatory of 

 the Duke of Northumberland, at Syon 

 near Kew, as far back as 1854. 



In Florida and California the mango- 

 steen has been tried on numerous 

 occasions, but without success. It is 

 not likely that it will ever prove adapt- 

 able to the continental United States. 



In Porto Rico it is not reported ever 

 to have fruited — due merely to the fact, 

 I believe, that it has not been adequately 

 tried. In Cuba a number of trees 

 have been planted, and some of them 

 are flourishing; none of them has yet 

 borne fruit. That they will under 

 proper conditions stand a very high 

 rainfall is evident from the climatic 

 records of the country of their origin. 

 Further, a tree 30 years old has long 

 been bearing fruit at St. Aroment, 

 Dominica, B. W. I., 400 feet above sea 

 level, where the average annual rainfall 

 is 105 inches; and at the Point Mulatre 

 estate in the same island arc a dozen 

 healthy trees, growing in rich valley- 

 soil under an average annual rainfall 

 of 150 inches. No report is available 

 on the fruiting of the latter trees. 



FLOURISHES IN CANAL ZONE 



The tree was introduced to the Canal 

 Zone nine years ago, in a rather in- 

 teresting way. Dr. W. W. Keene of 

 Philadelphia, traveling in Malaya, ate 

 the fruit, admired it and wrote to the 

 Secretary of Agriculture in Washington 

 asking whether it could not be intro- 

 duced to the Canal Zone. The Secre- 

 tarv referred the matter to me, and I 

 took it up with Col. Gorgas. After 

 investigating the possibilities, the canal 

 authorities finally decided to take u]) 

 the introduction of new i^lants that 

 promised to be of commercial \'alue, 

 and established an experimental garden. 

 Among the first things I sent them were 

 some mangosteens. They gave promise 

 of being a com]jlete success, but the 

 cxi)erimental garden was unfortunately 

 disctjntinued before any definite results 

 had been realized. Latch- the w(jrk 

 has been taken up again, and I con- 

 fidently expect to see the mangosteen 

 fruiting in the Canal Zone. 



There certainly can be no question, 

 that the ])lant is amenable to acclimati- 

 zation, and where the proper physical 



soil conditions are given it, which 

 conditions seem to have been generally 

 misunderstood, there is no reason why 

 this plant should not be as common 

 throughout the tropics of the Western 

 Hemisphere as it is in the Malay region. 

 Roxburgh's complaint that he coiild 

 not get plants to grow anywhere in 

 India has done much injury by dis- 

 couraging attempts to cultivate it and 

 loses force in the face of similar unjusti- 

 fied complaints formerly made in Ceylon 

 where now there are successful orchards 

 under cultivation. 



RELATIVES OF THE MANGOSTEEN 



There are several species of the big 

 genus to which the mangosteen belongs 

 that deserve attention as possible stocks 

 upon which to graft the latter advan- 

 tageously. The only record I have 

 found of any attempts being made in 

 the tropics to graft the mangosteen is 

 that in Woodrow's Gardening in India, 

 p. 173, where he states that he grafted 

 one upon a related species of Garcinia 

 {G. indica) at the request of a Revenue 

 Commissioner at Rutnagberry, where 

 104 inches of rain fall in a year and the 

 average temperature is 78. Unfor- 

 tunately, nothing is said as to the success 

 of this effort. Trials made at the 

 Peradeniya Gardens, in Ceylon, to 

 graft it upon another nearly related 

 species, Garcinia xanthochymus , met 

 with little success. This, however, does 

 not signify that any unsurmountable 

 difficulty would be encountered if the 

 most careful methods of grafting which 

 are in vogue in temperate regions were 

 employed, or if even a sufficiently large 

 number of trials were made. 



The Garcinia xanthochymus is a rapid 

 grower, abundant seed producer, and 

 easy of cultivation, and might prove 

 most valuable as a stock. If not, 

 however, there are a couple of hundred 

 other species which should be tested, 

 some of them with edible fruits and 

 others suited to dry hilly situations. 



By using the old method of inarching, 

 or "grafting by a])i)r()ach," G. W. Oliver 

 of the U. S. Department of Agriculture 

 was able to get altogether satisfactory 

 results in working the mangosteen on 

 twenty other species of the genus 



