LUTHER BURBANK 



which find its succulent slabs altogether to their 

 liking. 



Some uninformed newspaper reporters have 

 unfortunately given the impression to the pub- 

 lic that the seed of the improved varieties 

 could be sown on the desert land like wheat, and 

 grown without fencing or other protection. Let 

 us ask, what crop that man values in any country 

 is not fenced? The more valuable the crop, the 

 more carefully must it be protected. The very fact 

 that all herbivorous animals relish these new 

 creations proves their value and the necessity for 

 protecting them. 



BOTH FOOD AND DRINK 



So thoroughly appealing, indeed, is the flesh of 

 the cactus plant to the palate of the herbivorous 

 animals that many of them will feed on it even 

 when the slabs are protected by spines. 



There are regions in Mexico and Hawaii where 

 the cattle feed habitually on wild species of Opun- 

 tias, even though this involves the habitual inges- 

 tion of millions of spines and spicules with which 

 the slabs are protected; resulting quite often in 

 sickness or death of the animals. 



The manager of a ranch in Hawaii, writing to 

 the editor of the "Butchers' and Stockgrowers' 

 Journal," of California, under date of April 17, 

 1905, declares that on his ranch there is a paddock 



[218] 



