The Japanese Plums 43 



was begun in 1883, by W. P. Hammon & Co., of Oak- 

 land, California, and the variety was named after Mr. 

 Kelsey. After this several other importations were 

 made, especially by Luther Burbank of Santa Rosa, 

 California. Very soon seedlings began to appear, 

 grown in America, and the catalogue of Japanese 

 plums has since been swelling at an alarming rate. 



The Japanese plum is thought to be a native of 

 China, though it has never been found growing wild. 

 It was first described botanically by Roxburgh, who 

 found it in the botanic gardens at Calcutta. Accord- 

 ing to Georgeson it is considerably grown in a hap- 

 hazard sort of way, without much care or cultivation, 

 in Japan. It has not been carefully propagated there 

 by buds, and little pains has been spent on the nomen- 

 clature of the varieties by the Japanese. This ac- 

 counts for some of the confusion which we have to 

 labor with in this country. 



The Japanese plums, though so remarkably pop- 

 ular in America, seem to be still practically unknown 

 in Europe. They have suffered from too great a pop- 

 ularity in this country. They have been planted out 

 of all proportion to their relative merits. Untested 

 varieties have been introduced, boomed and sold to 

 planters, where they could be of little or no use. 

 Extravagant and fantastic claims have been made for 

 them. They have been said to be curculio proof (as 

 what plum has not?); they have been called proof 

 against black knot; they have been recently heralded 

 by a popular horticultural writer as "undoubtedly the 

 best in quality of any plums grown." All these state- 

 ments are misleading, disappointing, false. Lots of 

 folks have forgotten the little prophecy of Professor 

 Bailey in his first bulletin on the Japanese plums. He 

 said, "We can depend upon it that they will develop 

 weak points somewhere." They have, as a matter of 



