LUTHER BURBANK 



mis. This plant, as its Latin name suggests, has a 

 white stem. As to fruit, it rather closely resem- 

 bles the eastern black raspberry which is a parent 

 of our cultivated blackcap. It is a strong, vigorous 

 grower, producing stout upright canes and berries 

 that are unusually sweet and of a pleasing flavor. 



Several years ago, while in the Eel River region 

 in Humboldt County in California, I discovered 

 many excellent plants of this western blackcap of 

 specially vigorous growth, and producing berries 

 of extra size and quality. A large number of 

 berries were gathered from the most promising 

 plants, and their seeds carefully planted. 



After several years of planting and selecting, a 

 promising berry was produced, fully as good, I 

 think, as most eastern blackcaps and much larger 

 than any then known. Unfortunately, the stem 

 and backs of the leaves of the plant are covered 

 with long, sharp prickles, and these are so an- 

 noying in cultivating or picking the fruit that it 

 seems not worth while to introduce a plant thus 

 handicapped. 



There is opportunity, however, to do away with 

 these prickles through hybridizing and selective 

 breeding along the lines already fully detailed in 

 the account of the thornless blackberry in an 

 earlier chapter of the present volume. When this 

 has been done, the developed variety of the west- 



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