BERRIES AND GARDEN FRUITS 



garden, and it has many attractive qualities. It 

 is enormously productive, thrives under the most 

 adverse conditions, and bears a fruit so different 

 from any other of the products of the garden as 

 to have double attractiveness. 



A single plant will bear all the fruit that a 

 good-sized family could use. Sometimes half a 

 hundred fruits are borne on a single slab. The 

 best of Mr. Burbank's fruiting varieties bears, 

 on good soil, at the rate of more than one hundred 

 tons per acre. 



Unfortunately the new fruiting cactus plants 

 are not very hardy, but whoever lives in a region 

 to which they are adapted will find this a valua- 

 ble addition to the fruit garden. Meantime there 

 is opportunity for further experiment in selective 

 breeding with an eye to the production of hardier 

 varieties. 



There are varieties of cactus that thrive in the 

 coldest regions, and it is probable that by using 

 these in hybridizing experiments new varieties 

 might be developed that combine the fruiting 

 qualities of Mr. Burbank's new cactuses with the 

 hardiness of the other parent. Mr. Burbank him- 

 self has experiments under way looking to this 

 end, but there is no reason why his efforts should 

 not be supplemented by those of many other 

 workers. 



The cactus is a comparatively easy plant to 

 hybridize, its flowers being large and conspicuous. 

 It is necessary, however, to watch the flowers 

 closely and cross-fertilize them at once when they 



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