16 CIRCULAR NO, 120, BUREAU OF PLANT INDUSTRY. 
Hybridization and grafting work has been done on the peach, plum, 
persimmon, and grape. Successful crosses between the native Prunus 
texana and the peach and plum have been made. The grafting of 
the better types of grapes on the native mustang grape has been 
done successfully (fig. 6). Some attention is also being given to 
grafting the English walnut on the native black walnut. 
PERSIM MONS. 
The propagation of persimmons has been tried, a special effort 
being made to utilize as a stock the native Texas persimmon (Dios- 
pyros texana), which grows so abundantly and persistently on the 
semiarid lands of western Texas and in the limestone canyons. This 
tree has long been regarded as a probable stock for the Japanese 
persimmon, but until recently it was impossible to produce a union. 
Successful results have lately been accomplished by inarching with 
Diospyros texana seedlings small enough to be handled in pots. In 
this method of inarching, the small native seedling is transferred to 
a paper pot after most of the soil has been removed from the roots, 
and the pot is filled with sphagnum. It is necessary that the pots 
be small and light, for under normal summer conditions the wind 
would prevent securely fastening a heavy pot in position long enough 
to permit the formation of a union. The stock and scion will com- 
monly unite in about 30 days, but as the persimmon grows rather 
slowly even more time is desirable. Until this method was devised, 
no successful Diospyros kaki plants had been produced on LD. texana 
stock. A few crown grafts were made to start, but no others. 
Budding has been attempted repeatedly by shield, patch, flute, and 
ring methods, with no success whatever. The following combina- 
tions have been successfully accomplished here by the inarch method 
described : 
D. kaki on D. texana stock. 
D. virginiana on D. tewzana stock. 
D. texana on D. kaki stock. 
D. texana on D. virginiana stock. 
A small planting of varieties of Japanese persimmons worked on 
the native stock is to be made under dry-land conditions as soon as 
the trees can be propagated. Several have already been set to orchard 
positions. As most species of the Japanese persimmon suffer from 
chlorosis on the soils of the San Antonio region, it is believed that 
the use of this resistant stock may be a remedy for this trouble unless 
the scion proves to rapidly outgrow the stock. 
[Cir, 120] 
