NOTES ON PLUM CULTURE. 
5 
ries. Its representatives are widely distributed over the 
earth and the number of species as given by different au- 
thors varies greatly. Bentham and Hooker in their Genera 
Plantarum place the number at about eighty. A later work, 
the Index Kewensis, recognizes 121 species, and records 290 
names as s3monyms. The 121 species here considered valid 
are distributed as follows: 
Eastern hemisphere 87 species, 15 of which are credited 
to Japan and 12 to China. Western hemisphere 32 species, 
21 of which belong to the United States and the region 
north. Seven are credited to Mexico and four to South 
America and the West Indies. Two species are recorded 
as of unknown origin. 
Our American manuals record species of the genus as 
■follows: 
Botany of California ( 1876), 6 species. 
Chapman’s Flora of the Southern States (1883), 7 spe- 
cies. 
Coulter’s Manual of the Rocky Mountain Region ( 1885) , 
5 species, i variety. 
Gray’s Manual, 6th Ed. (1890), 10 species, i introduced 
variety. 
Coulter’s Flora of Texas ( 1891), 8 species. 
The Britton and Brown Flora (1897), id native, 4 intro- 
duced species, 2 native and i introduced varieties. 
d'aken together these floras recognize 27 native and 4 
introduced species, and 3 native and one introduced varie- 
ties. 
Of the native representatives of the genus, 16 species 
and I variety are true plums, or of such close affinity as to 
readily class with them, while 1 1 species and two varieties 
are cherries or belong with the cherry group. Nearly all 
the species enumerated in the manuals are, or have been at 
some time, introduced into gardens and cultivated, either for 
their fruits or as ornamentals, but the varieties now cata- 
logued by nurserymen and grown in orchard, represent but 
few species. Of the native cherries only the shrubby sand- 
cherries {Prunus pumila, P. Bcsseyi, and P. cuneata) are 
grown for fruit. Il'he Wild Red Cherry {P. Pemisylvanica^ 
is occasionally used as a stock upon which the common sour 
cherries, of European origin, are grafted; it has also been 
used to a limited extent as a stock for some of the plums. 
Of the native plum group, three species (/^. Americana, 
P. kortulana with its variety Mmeri, and P. an^usti folia) 
have furnished nearly all of the cultivated varieties. The 
Beach plum [^P. maritinia) is the parent of butone variety of 
