248 DATE GROWING 



Specimens in the United States are still too 

 young to have borne fruit. 



Itima, see Yatimeh. 



Kanta, Kenta, The Vigorous, a highly prized 

 dry date both in North Africa and the United States. 

 It is of medium size, attractive in color, of good 

 flavor, bears heavily, keeps remarkably well, and 

 ripens comparatively early. 



Kearney was told that it frequently bore 330 

 pounds of fruit, and heard of one tree that was said 

 to have borne 770 pounds, and others 200 years old 

 that bore 265 pounds of fruit annually. The tall, 

 stout palm is characterized by broad leaves with 

 numerous long, rather narrow leaflets. The long 

 leafstalks are spiny only near the base. Light 

 orange stalks of fruit-clusters are stout and horizontal 

 or ascending, and so short that with the bunches they 

 do not equal the leafstalks. The clusters themselves 

 are short, thick and densely crowded with fruit. 

 The palm seems to be resistant to alkali if it is on 

 well-drained soil. 



The fruit keeps even better than most dry dates, 

 never losing its shape or becoming hard and brittle. 

 Its season is early October. 



The date is one and one-third to one and two- 

 thirds inch long, about one-half as wide, narrowed 

 from the middle or above it to the broad apex, dull 

 bay colored when ripe, the skin rufous or hazel colored, 

 smooth, much loosened in large blisters. Flesh one- 

 eighth to three-sixteenths inch thick, dry but not 

 hard. Seed somewhat more than one- half as long as 

 the fruit, one-third to two-fifths as wide as it is long, 



