ON THE CHERRY 
gent, but which is not without qualities of virility 
and hardiness that might make it a valuable 
hybridizing agent. 
This is perhaps the hardiest of all cherries. | 
have seen it growing wild nearly as far north as 
Hudson Bay, in regions where it is not uncommon 
for the mercury to fall sixty degrees below zero. 
The California holly-leaf cherry and the Cata- 
lina cherry are species that may be available for 
the development of other desirable qualities—for 
it is not in hardiness alone that the best varieties 
sometimes are found wanting; though the species 
just named are so far separated biologically and 
physiologically that it may be impossible to com- 
bine them. 
Many cultivated cherries, for example, are 
unable to withstand the warm spring rains with- 
out serious loss from cracking of the fruit. Some- 
times almost an entire crop will thus be ruined. 
Again many cherries are susceptible to blight. A 
bulletin issued by the State Commission of Hor- 
ticulture of California lists more than twenty in- 
sects—leaf hoppers, scales, mites, caterpillars, and 
borers—that prey more or less upon root or bark 
or leaf of the cherry tree, or that attack its fruit. 
Then there are inherent maladies, such as the 
tendency to overflow and condensation of sap, 
forming an injurious gum that may induce decay 
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