LUTHER BURBANK 



It should be added that the plum which has 

 been induced to vary in the matter of seed pro- 

 duction, is not always content merely to have cast 

 out the stone but sometimes tends to eliminate 

 the seed itself. 



The Seed Also Must Go 



One of my stoneless plums has nothing but a 

 jelly-like substance to take the place of the seed. 

 It is probable that plums actually seedless as well 

 as stoneless will prove favorites with some fruit 

 growers. 



Of course plums that present this anomaly 

 cannot be propagated from the seed. But in 

 this regard they do not differ from a number of 

 cultivated plants, including the potato, the horse- 

 radish, and the sugar-cane. And for that matter 

 it must be recalled that very few orchard fruits 

 are reproduced from the seed. The favorite 

 varieties of apples and pears are so blended that 

 they do not breed true from the seed. If you 

 were to plant the seed of a Baldwin apple, a 

 Bartlett pear, or a sugar prune, there is only 

 the remotest chance that you would produce a 

 seedling that would resemble the parent. 



Yet apples and pears and prunes are prop- 

 agated year after year by means of buds and 

 grafts. The same method of propagation would 

 of course suffice for the seedless plum. 



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