28 Plums and Plum Culture 



It will be noticed that more than half of these are 

 Russian varieties; also that all the Russian varieties 

 are referred to this type. It seems to inherit a hardy, 

 thrifty, north-European strain of the Domestica blood, 

 somewhat less encumbered with the amenities of high 

 culture than the German, French and Italian types. 

 It is, in fact, in these Russian varieties that the writer 

 finds his justification for the attempt to separate Lom- 

 bard from Bradshaw jn a scheme like the foregoing. 



The Domesticas doubtless exhibit at present 

 the highest degree of amelioration known among 

 plums. Perhaps it would not be too much to say that 

 they show a greater improvement upon the original 

 wild forms than any other fruit in the whole horticul- 

 tural catalogue. There is reason enough for this in 

 the fact that they have been subjected to all the im- 

 proving influences of cultivation for at least four hun- 

 dred years, probably longer, whereas the American 

 species have been impressed into our gardens prac- 

 tically within the last quarter century; and the Jap- 

 anese plums have not been carefully propagated and 

 selected until they reached this country within the 

 memory of the youngest fruit growers. Doubtless 

 the American and Japanese species have greater unde- 

 veloped possibilities, and in certain positive good 

 qualities they are already superior to the Domesticas. 

 The future no man can predict; but for the present, 

 this comparison of the evolution progress of the sev- 

 eral classes of plums is certainly fair. 



The Domesticas are specially adapted to a some- 

 what restricted range of soil and climate on this con- 

 tinent. They prove entirely satisfactory in Nova 

 Scotia, central New England, New York, southern 

 Ontario and Michigan, and the Pacific coast states. 

 Even in these districts they come into sharp competi- 

 tion with some of the Japanese and native sorts. 



