176 LUTHER BURBANK 



dant bearers. Regularity of bearing is a factor 

 for which I have worked constantly, and it has 

 been instilled into all my new varieties of plums. 

 These trees are not constructed on the hit or miss 

 plan. They can be depended on to give a crop 

 each year. It requires no argument to show that 

 the expense of starting an orchard can be paid 

 much more rapidly by trees that will bear abun- 

 dantly each season. An enormous crop every 

 other year would not at all take the place of even 

 a moderate crop every year. But my new plums 

 are not only regular bearers, but most abundant 

 bearers as well. 



Sometimes the grower is deceived by receiving 

 a large price for a variety of fruit that is pro- 

 duced in such small quantity as to bring a 

 meager aggregate return. 



The wise orchardist, however, will look for a 

 fruit that will produce abundantly and at the 

 same time being a good price per basket. The 

 Tragedy at $2.00 a crate would generally pay 

 much less than the Burbank at $1.00 a crate, 

 owing to the difference in the productiveness of 

 the two varieties. But the Tragedy, even with 

 its small production, averages (according to the 

 returns of last year) only 19 cents a crate more 

 than the Burbank. And of course the Burbank 

 was one of my earliest introductions. Some of 



