NEW CREATIONS IN PLANT LIFE 



always expected to produce about double as 

 much as during the first year. While Mr. 

 Burbank does not expect more than about 

 one-fourth as large a yield as this on a desert 

 soil without irrigation, say, at a conservative 

 figure, twenty tons per acre, he does expect 

 nearly or quite twice as much, — from one 

 hundred and fifty to one hundred and eighty 

 tons per acre, — in a very warm climate with 

 perhaps one or two light irrigations per year. 

 These figures give something of the enor- 

 mous economic importance of this new plant 

 for forage. The average yield of clover, alfalfa, 

 timothy and the like, is not at the outside 

 more than one-fortieth as large as the yield 

 already established at Mr. Burbank's grounds 

 in soil and climate, as indicated, not supposed 

 to be particularly favorable to cactus-growing. 

 While the leguminous plants, as alfalfa and 

 clover, are richer in protein than the cactus, 

 and while they will doubtless never be dis- 

 placed altogether because of their value in 

 helping produce a model balanced ration, yet 

 the vast difference in the yield suggests how 

 very great is to be the influence of this new 

 plant upon the feeding of animal life. It is of 



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