THE STONELESS PLUM 



And when, two years later, the grafts thus 

 selected bore fruit, it was delightful to find my 

 predictions verified; the fruit was almost abso- 

 lutely stoneless, only the faintest splinter of stone 

 occasionally appearing. And combined with this 

 stoneless condition there were qualities of size 

 and flavor that made the fruit practically equal to 

 the French prune. Moreover, as is often the case 

 with hybrids one strain of which is wild stock, 

 the new plum proved to be a very good bearer. 



So my ideal of an eatable plum having no 

 stone about its seed was almost achieved. 



I say almost achieved because there still 

 remained, in the case of the plums of best quality, 

 a fragment of shell which varied from a small 

 crescent about one side of the kernel to an almost 

 invisible granule. There were some individual 

 plants among the numberless seedlings that bore 

 fruit in which the stone was absolutely eliminated 

 and, in some cases, the seed also. 



But it proved extremely difficult to combine 

 this quality of entire stonelessness with the 

 desirable qualities of size and flavor, lacking 

 which the fruit could have no practical value. 



Further hybridizing experiments, aimed at the 

 production of an absolutely stoneless plum of 

 fine flavor, are still under way; but in the 

 meantime there are several varieties actually in 



tin] 



