PLUM. 301 



Plum, continued. 



hand. The strong-growing species and varieties, espe- 

 cially southwards, will give stocks strong enough to bud 

 the first season ; but the weaker ones must stand until the 

 next season after the seeds are planted. In all the north- 

 ern states, however, plum pits are usually sown in seed- 

 beds, in the same manner as apple and pear seeds. The 

 seedlings are taken up in the fall, and the following spring 

 set out in nursery rows, where they are budded in August. 



Plums are extensively grown from suckers, which spring 

 in great numbers from the roots of many species. In 

 France this method of propagation is largely used. So 

 long as graftage does not intervene, the sprouts will repro- 

 duce the variety ; and even in grafted or budded trees this 

 sometimes occurs, but it is probably because the tree has 

 become own-rooted from the rooting of the cion. It is a 

 common notion that trees grown from suckers sprout or 

 sucker worse than those grown from seeds. Layers are 

 also sometimes employed for the propagation of the 

 plum. Strong stools (page 39) are grown, and the long 

 and .strong shoots are covered in spring throughout their 

 length — the tips only being exposed — and every bud will 

 produce a plant. Strong shoots of vigorous sorts will 

 give plants strong enough the first fall to be removed into 

 nursery rows. Mound-layering is also employed with 

 good results. Root cuttings, handled like those of black- 

 berry, grow readily, but some growers suppose that they 

 produce trees which sucker badly. Many plums grow 

 readily from cuttings of the mature recent wood, treated 

 the same as long grape cuttings. This is especially true 

 of the Marianna (which is a form of Myrobalan, or a 

 hybrid of it and some native plum of the Wild Goose 

 type), which is grown almost exclusively from cuttings. 

 Some sorts of the common garden plum (P. domestica) 

 also grow from cuttings. 



Plums are worked in various ways, but ordinary shield- 

 budding is usually employed in late summer or early fall, 

 as for peaches and cherries. Root-grafting by the com- 

 mon whip method is sometimes employed, especially when 

 own-rooted trees are desired (pages 109, no). In the north 

 and east, the common plum (P. domestica) is habitually 

 worked upon stocks of the same species, and these are 

 always to be preferred. These stocks, if seedlings, are 

 apt to be very variable in size and habit, and sometimes 

 half or more of any batch, even from selected seeds, are 

 practically worthless. Stocks from inferior or constant 



