erally unnoticed here and there in every 

 part of the earth where the thorny ones 

 grew, the seeds no doubt scattered by 

 birds and other agencies. Some of these 

 bore fairly good but seedy fruits and have 

 been locally cultivated for ages, but have 

 never received specific horticultural names 

 or descriptions, though the fruits of these 

 and the thorny ones have long been used 

 extensively as food and are the principal 

 source of food for millions of human be- 

 ings in Southern Europe, North Africa, 

 Mexico and other lands, for about three 

 months in each year. 



Systematic work for their improvement 

 has shown how pliable and readily mould- 

 ed is this unique, hardy denizen of rocky, 

 drought-cursed, wind-swept, sun-blistered 

 districts, and how readily it adapts itself 

 to more fertile soils and how rapidly it 

 improves under cultivation and improved 

 conditions. 



Some one asks: "Won't they run wild 

 a^ain and produce thorns, when placed 

 under desert conditions?" 



Has the "Burbank" plum, which though 

 introduced twenty-two years ago, and 

 is now more widely grown than any 

 other plum on this earth, shown a tend- 

 ency to be different in Africa, Borneo, 

 Japan, Egypt, Madagascar or France? 

 No, it is the same everywhere and the res- 

 idents of Chicago, Auckland, London, San 

 Francisco, New York and Valparaiso con- 

 sume them in great (and rapidly increas- 

 ing) numbers of carloads each season. 

 The same may be said of the later intro- 

 duced Wickson, America and numerous 

 other plums and of my improved fruits 

 and flowers which are extensively grown 

 and generally offered for sale by most re- 

 sponsible firms in all civilized countries 

 and are generally slowly but very surely 

 replacing the old and heretofore standard 

 varieties. 



It will be so with these "new creations" 

 in Opuntia. Tens of thousands of others 

 not now ready to be distributed are under 

 test, this catalog partially describing only 

 the beginnings of a great work with the 

 Opuntias, which in importance may be 

 classed with the discovery of a new con- 

 tinent. 



Does this work, which has been only 

 just briefly outlined, mean anything? 



Intelligent people everywhere know 

 well that it means a new agricultural era 

 for whole continents like Australia and 

 Africa, and millions of otherwise useless 

 acres in North and South America, Eu- 

 rope and Asia. 



And now during the past three years 

 the United States Department of Agri- 

 culture has despatched agents to all 

 parts where cacti grow to look up this 

 matter among those who had for years 

 been feeding the wild, thorny ones to 

 their stock with good results when prop- 

 erly prepared by fire, though it is ac- 

 knowledged that thus prepared, a portion 

 of their nutritive value is lost and though 

 the dangers of loss from feeding to stock 

 are lessened, are not by any means made 

 safe, even by singeing or any other pro- 

 cess, while many of these new thornless 

 ones are as safe to handle and as safe to 

 feed as beets, potatoes, carrots or pump- 

 kins. 



But let it be understood that these 

 thorns are not growing on the wild Opun- 

 ~tias for ornament any more than poison 

 fangs, teeth, claws and stings are pos- 

 sessed by various animals. 



They are for defense, and when de- 

 prived of these defenses they must be 

 protected from stock like any other feed 

 grown in farm, fields or gardens. 



Still some doubter who has no knowl- 

 edge of desert conditions or of these new 

 plants will say, "Will it pay?" Does any- 

 thing pay? Some people seem to think 

 that corn, wheat, oats, barley, cotton, rice, 

 tobacco, melons and potatoes pay. 



How many tons of hay, beets or pota- 

 toes can be raised each season on an acre 

 of good soil? Yes, well, by actual weight 

 in the summer of 1906 in the cool coast 

 climate of Sonoma County, Cal., on a 

 heavy, black "adobe" soil, generally 

 thought wholly unsuited for cactus, my 

 new Opuntias produced the first year, six 

 months from single rooted leaves, planted 

 about June 1, an average of 47^2 pounds 

 per plant or one-fourth acre, yielding at 

 the distance planted (2^x5 feet), at the 

 rate of 180,230 pounds, over ninety tons, 

 of forage per acre. 



