94^ CALIF.ORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



crops. The first effort in selection must have been to 

 eliminate these male flowers, as both they and the part of 

 the -receptacle on which the3A grow are hard, dry and oth- 

 erwise not p'alatable. Thus in the Croisic fig (26) the 

 male flowers, together with their part of the receptacle, 

 is always removed before eating, and this necessary pro- 

 cess must have first stimulated efforts to produce a fig- 

 without the objectionable parts. While this selection and 

 improvement of edible figs was being carried on by the 

 ancient cultivators the wild fig was not entirely left to it- 

 self. It was found necessary in some instances to pro- 

 pagate even the wild fig in order to procure the figs for 

 caprification. What would be more natural than to sup- 

 pose that those figs were especially propagated which pro- 

 duced greater abundance of pollen? This selection in a 

 small way would in time give rise to several types even 

 among the wild figs, similar to those perhaps as have been 

 described by Pontedera, Gallesio and others. 



After the first objectionable features of male flowers 

 were eliminated other improvements followed as to flavor, 

 taste and sweetness, etc. 



GENERAL REMARKS ON CAPRIFICATION. 



Caprification is a horticultural process, which consists 

 in suspending the profichi or summer figs of the caprifig 

 on the branches of the edible fig. The object of caprifi- 

 cation is to produce seed in the edible figs and to cause 

 these latter to set and mature. Only such profichi as con- 

 tain fig wasps — Blaslofhaga -psenes — are of any value in 

 caprification. Shortly after the profichi have been sus- 

 pended the female Blastophagas hatch out of their galls 

 and in their efforts to leave the fig become covered with 

 the ripe pollen of the caprifig. Once outside of the cap- 

 rifig the Blastophagas search for other caprifigs in order 



