64 THE PLUMS OF NEW YORK. 



that it is to be found in the greatest abundance in the region extend- 

 ing from southern Iowa through Missotiri. Only two varieties of this 

 plum, Wolf and Van Buren, are in general ctiltivation, both of which 

 originated in Iowa. In neither fruit nor tree-characters do these differ 

 greatly from the Americana plums. 



A plum with pubescent leaves belonging to the Americana series 

 known locally as the Big Tree plum, occurs from western Tennessee, south- 

 westward through the extreme southern portion of Missouri, through 

 Arkansas, southern Oklahoma, extending westward in central Texas, at 

 least, as far as the Colorado River and reaching its southwestern limit 

 in northern Mexico. From specimens of this plum in several herbaria 

 and from studies made of it in the field by W. F. Wight of the United 

 States Department of Agriculture, it would seem that this plum is a dis- 

 tinct species, its chief distinguishing character being the great size attained 

 by the tree. So far as it is known the Big Tree has no cultivated forms 

 lanless it be Bilona, supposed to be a hybrid between this species and 

 Prunus triflora, now growing on the grounds of F. T. Ramsey, Austin, 



II. PRUNUS HORTULANA Bailey' 



I. Bailey Gar. and For. 5:90. 1892. 2. Sargent Sil. N. Am. 4:23, PI. 151. 1892. 3. Waugh 

 Vt. Sta. An. Rpt. 10:99-105. 1897. 4. Mohr Torrey Bot. Club Bid. 26:118. 1899. 5. Bailey 

 Cyc. Am. Hort. 1450, fig. 1901. 6. Mohr Cont. U. S. Nat. Herb. 6:551. 1901. 



P. americana, var. ? 7. Patterson List PI. Oquawka 5. 1874. 



Tree attaining a height of thirty feet or more, vigorous in growth; trunk sometimes 

 a foot in diameter; trunk and branches rough and shaggy becoming furrowed in age; 

 bark gray-brown, thick and containing deposits of red cork cells which show as bright 



' A brief account of the life of Liberty Hyde Bailey appeared in The Grapes of New York (page 

 142), but his work with plums deserves further mention. The foundation of our present knowl- 

 edge of the cultivated species and races of American and Triflora plums was laid by the compre- 

 hensive study of these fruits made by Bailey in the closing decade of the Nineteenth Century. His 

 examination of plums may be said to have begun in 1886 with the setting of an orchard of native 

 plums — ^probably the first general collection of these plums planted — on the groimds of the Michigan 

 Agricultural College, Lansing, Michigan. The results of his studies have largely appeared in the 

 publications of the Cornell Agricultural Experiment Station, the first of which was The Cultivated 

 Native Plums and Cherries published in 1892; The Japanese Plums, 1894; Revised Opinions of the 

 Japanese Plums, 1896; Third Report upon Japanese Plums, 1897; Notes upon Plums, 1897. Beside 

 these bulletins a monograph of the native plums was published in The Evolution of our Native Fruits 

 in 1898 and a brief but complete monograph of the Genus Prunus in the Cyclopedia of American 

 Horticulture in 1901. These are but the chief titles under which his studies of plums have appeared, 

 several minor contributions having been printed from time to time in the horticultural press. While 

 Dr. Bailey has given especial attention to all fruits grown in eastern America, it is probable that 

 pomology is most indebted to him for his long and painstaking work with the difficult Genus Prunus 

 with which he has done much to set the varieties and species in order. 



