LUTHER BURBANK 



pages merely as the experiment farm at 

 Sebastopol. 



The farm has a gradual and gentle slope toward 

 the Santa Rosa valley. It is undulating in con- 

 tour, and its chief slopes face the east. The soil is 

 sandy, no doubt part of one of many great sand 

 dunes piled up by the waves of the Pacific Ocean 

 and the winds in past ages. 



On this place there is a great variety of soils 

 and of degrees of moisture. Some parts of the 

 land are so moist that the water seeps up to the 

 surface throughout the season, and the remainder 

 is so loose and friable that moisture may be found 

 all through the summer even six months after any 

 rain has fallen upon it. 



Native Plants 



At the time the place was purchased about two- 

 thirds of it was covered with white and tan oaks, 

 the native Douglas spruce, manzanita, cascara 

 sagrada, hazel and madrona, while beneath the 

 trees grew brodiaeas, calochortus, cynoglossum, 

 wild peas, fritillarias, orchids, sisyrinchiums — yel- 

 low and blue — and numerous other wild plants 

 and shrubs. 



During the first few years following the clear- 

 ing away of this forest many species of clover 

 wholly new to me made their appearance, prob- 

 ably in all nearly or quite twenty species. There 



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