The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1900-04-29

the dealers have decided that IL was more
to their advantage to keep control OF the
main stock of a new fruit and sell the
new wood for grating. Consequently this
grating wood OF fine varieties is sold at
from s. TO SIS per foot. which is not so
high as IL sounds. since especially fine
large fruit in almost any sort always finds
Already market at double the price or COM
mon stock.
1t = not to be inferred from the forego-
ing Nerences 10 Burbank that he Is the
only man in this line OF business. though
he is one of the most prominent. and the
name of his famous potato and the story
Of its development from a single SEED mas
made him famous throughout the aericul-
tural world. One of the most noted craps
experts. say twenty years back, was j. IA.
Ricketts,. whose work is known to all agri-
of ground at Newburg. n. Y. he produced
over a score Of recognized varieties OF new
grapes, the control of one or which, the
Empire State, he is said 10 have sold Tor
$4,000. He was financially crippled. now
ever, in the panic of 1913. and Is now en-
ployed in one of the branches of the gov
eminent printing office.
DEVELOPED THE STRAWBERRY.
C. NJ. Hovey, of Boston. is another man
who worked orchard miracles on a frac-
ton of an acre of ground. Ii is to him
that the United States practically owes its
entire strawberry industry. Hovey having
developed a commercial fruit from the old
wild varieties that were hardly worth the
eating.
Probably a score of other workers In this
branch of applied science could be named.
all of whom would be familiar TO every
nurserymen in the country. Their number
is increasing rapidly. as the principles OF
hybridization are becoming more generally
appreciated. One of the things that hold
back men from devoting themselves to this
line of research is that there is no legal
protection for the men who make an i'm
provement in the vegetable world. Nurs-
erymen say that If by years of patient
work a man can develop a prune twice as
large as any heretofore known, and which
is correspondingly more valuable for pack
ing and shipping. he certainly ought TO be
protected in reaping the reward of his
labor quite as much as the man who in
vents a rev horseshoe nail or a new pencil
sharpener. But as the case stands, the
latter has the patent law TO, protect him.
While any one who can get hold OF a single
seed of the new prune or a single sprtg or
grating wood has In his grasp a whole or
chard of the new fruit. and there is no law
TO stop him. This comparison happens not
to be and idle simile. either. Just such a
prune has been developed by one of the
hybridizing gardeners in California IL
promises 10 double the value of the prune
industry on the Pacific coast in the next
few years. Yet the man who developed this
fruit has the choice Of selling IL outright
for a few thousand dollars or of peddling
out a few hundred feet OF grating wood
at so much per foot.
MADE BLACK WHITE.
Even a worse case than this happened
to another hybrid worker. He developed a
white blackberry. the first of its sort. a
magnificent fruit and very valuable. He
sold the control of the stock for a fair
price to a big nursery concern. but before
he got his money the firm failed. He had
to take back his plants. but some of them
had got out to the public in the mean
time. and the result was that in a little
while there were a dozen dealers Offering
white blackberry stock for sale at a quar-
ter of what il would have taken TO pay the
originator for his five seasons Of work and
experiment.
While the inducements 20 individuals to
go into this line Of experiment are COM
paratively small the Agricultural Depart
ment is not bounded by pecuniary consid-
erations, and has done a large amount OK
this work on its own responsibility, giving
the public the advantage of IL. The seed
less orange, which now practically d0mf-
mates the American market. is one of the
results of the departments work. Its de-
velopment is a long and interesting story
In itself. The department In the same way
is now working to develop. a frost-proof
orange by interbreeding the sweet orange
and the japanese trifoliata, which is as
hardy as a pine tree. The crossing OF the
Japanese sand pear with American stock
resulted in extending the latitude of prof
table pear culture nearly LOCO miles south
in this country, and the apple tree is grad
ually being developed by breeding TIL IL
can be successfully raised in Georgia. and
IL is believed IL will be extended in time to
all of the Southern States.