Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 75, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 March 1912 — OUR PLANT IMMIGRANTS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

OUR PLANT IMMIGRANTS

By DAVID FAIRCHILD

IN CHARGE OF ■ mmem seed ana PLANT WTStODUaiON, DEPART-

O the traveler who has wan* * dered with men of many H tastes all over the world, the thought must often Bi/ nr Si have come, “Of what use 9U[ PNM are all the strange plants ■ which make up the land|Jr9nr\JHi. scapes of the pictures ?” V / The globe, with its kaleidoK i j£SG| scopic panorama of -people, * pf'Vßr’n animals, and plants, has 1 rr* ‘ I been whirled before you, * as it were, and you have in your minds the picture of a ball circling through space, covered with a film of plants, animals, and men in constant change. So varied is this film of plants that there are probably half a million distinct, specific forms in it, and yet man uses only a few hundreds for his own purposes. To change, in a measure, the distribution of the really useful plants of the world is what the office of foreign seed and plant introduction of the Department of Agriculture is trying to do. The motive underlying this work might be called the ambition to make the world more habitable. If one is inclined to be pessimistic with regard to the food supply pt the world, be has only to talk to any one of the enthusiasts of the Department of Agriculture to get a picture of the widening vista ' of agricultural possibilities which would make him realise that the food problems of the race are not hung in the balance of our great plains area, and that the food-producing power of the world is still practicaly unknown, because we have just begun to study in a modern way the'relative performance of different plants. We may not always grow the plants we do now. Some, of them are expensive food producers, some produce foods that are difficult to digest, and some we may leave behind as we learn to like others better. What to grow was not so serious a question to the early Phoenician peasant, who knew perhaps a dozen crops, as it is becoming to the American agriculturist, who can pick from the crops of all the world the one best suited to his land and climate. Changes come so rapidly nowadays that if a man today talks of “pears” he may mean what-are ordinarily thought of as pears, or he may refer to alligator pears which he is growing in Florida, or * prickly pears which he Is cultivating In Texas. Both the alligator pear and the prickly pear haver come in as crops to be reckoned with within the past fifteen years, and already the stock-raisers of the South are wondering if they should plant spiny or spineless forms of the prickly pear cactus, and the fruitgrowers of Florida are inquiring as to which of the several varieties of alligator pear tree is going to be the most productive and profitable. To help find the plant which will produce the best results of any that can be grown, on every acre of land in the United States, is, in general, the broad policy of the office of seed and plant introduction of the bureau of plant Industry. Although begun in a systematic way and as a distinct activity of the department in 1897, it has barely touched the fringe of its possibilities. The 31,000 different plant Immigrants which have come in, and have either died or are now growing somewhere in this country, represent a small beginning only, and have merely helped to show the greatness of the possibilities which progress in agricultural research is creating. “You will soon have all the crops in," is the remark of those who have given the matter little thought. Our own lives change with every moment of time, and so do the lives of V plants. The strains of potato which our grandfathers grew are, with few exceptions, different from the strains in vogue today; and, fitting their lives into, the various conditions of soil and climate, the original wild South American species of potato, Solanum tuberosum, assumes in the hands of men a thousand different forms. In whatever parts of the world new forms may spring into existence it matters not; our potato-growers should be able to try every sort of importance and every wild, hardy species, whether it comes from the manse of a Scottish parson. Is discovered as a wild species along the Paraguay river by an American railway bridge builder, is found among the mountains of Colombia by Jesuit priest, Is gathered by a forest ranger in the dry regions of an Indian reservation in New „ Mexico, or is secured by a trained collector from. the Chiloe Islands off the coast of Chile. It makes little difference; they must all come in as plant immigrants to show what they can do in the gardens of American experts. There Is always the chance that they may be thrown out as unprofitable; but, if they have desirable characters, they can be blended with others, or exploited with others, if they are superior ■regions of this country. any that every day plant - irent parts of the world and every day, through of these disinfected arnew home in some part ter to give an adequate ' gnltude and importance stream of new plant fanyears baa been poorteg

Into the country,' and has been directed by a great and growing body of research men and women into those regions where It was thought they might make ..their homes. In the brief space of a short article, and to avoid what would be almost a bare enumeration of plant names, I prefer to treat only of a few of the many Important problems with which the office is working, passing by, also, the introduction of the Durum wheat, the Japanese rice, and givlnglfte Rfoeriain alfalfas, which are earning for the farmers of the country many millions of dollars a year, a bare mention, for the reason that they have been so often described in the newspapers of the country. The mango is one of the really great fruits of the world. India, with its hundreds of millions of people,- has for centuries held it sacred, and celebrates annual ceremonies in its honor. The great Mogul Akbar, who reigned in the 16th century, planted the famous Lak Bag, an orchard of a hundred thousand mangoes, and some of these still remain alive. It is a fruit the importance of which Americans are at last beginning to recognize, notwithstanding the unfortunate discredit which the worthless Beedling mangos of the West Indies have given it in the minds of Americans generally. There are probably more varieties of mangoe than there are of peaches. I have heard of one collection cf 600 different sorts in India. There are exquisitely flavored varieties no larger than a plum, and there are delicious sorts the fruits of which are six pounds in weight In India, where the wage of a coolie is not over 10 cents a day, there are varieties which sell for $6.60 a hundred, and the commonest sorts bring over a cent apiece. The great mango trees of India are said to reach a height of 70 feet and are so loaded down with fruit that over $l6O worth has been sold from a single tree. These fine varieties, practically as free from fiber as a freestone peach, can be eaten with a spoon as easily as a cantaloupe. Trainloads of these are shipped from the mangogrowing centers of India and distributed in the densely peopled cities of that great semi-trop-ical empire; and yet notwithstanding the great Importance of this fruit the agricultural study of it from the new standpoint has scarcely been begun. I believe that it has never, for example, been tested on any but Its own roots. We have gathered together in Florida and Porto Rico and Hawaii more than a hundred varieties, and some which we have fruited have already attracted the attention of the fancy fruit-dealers, who agree that tins* demand for these will increase as fast as the* supply can be created, and maintain that extravagant prices, such as 60 or even 76 cents apiece, will be paid for the large, showy, delicious fruits. Inst year 300 dozen Mulgoba mangos were sold to Florida tor 33 a dosen. The Governor of Porto Rico has committed himself to a policy which, if carried out, will covet the island with hundreds of thousands of mango of the better Yirlttfut .... ■,?>;. ■ v%. \ -

One of the oldest cultivated plants in the world Is the date palm. At least 4,000 years ago It was growing on the banks of the Euphrates, and it Is this plant and the camel that together made It possible for the Arabs to populate the great deserts of northern Africa and Asia. The date palms would grow where the water was alkaline, and the camels were able to make long journeys across the desert to take the dates to the coast to market and sell them for wheat and olives. In these deserts of the old world, millions of Arabs live on dates, for the date palm can be cultivated on land bo salty as to prevent the culture of any other paying crop, and It will live in the hottest regions on the face of the globe; not even a temperature of 125 degrees P. will affect It This obliging plant does not, however, insist on such temperatures, but will stand some frost end has been known to live where the mercury falls to 12 degrees P. It Is also the only wood obtainable in the oases of the Sahara, and on the shores of Arabia boats are made of It T The date palm has both male and female flowers and they occur on separate plants, and the Arabs have to plant one male for every plantation of a hundred females, metowg a harem as. It were. The artificial pollination or fertilisation of the female palms Is one of the most Interesting processes practiced with plants, a spray of flowers from a male palm being bound with a bit of palm-leaf fiber In each Inflorescence of the female tree. Props* gatlon of the date palm can be accomplished by means of seeds, or suckers, whleh are thrown up at the base of the palm. Suckers will stain, however, on land so salty that th|p seeds refuse to grow on it >r* Pour years from seed, trees of some varieties begin to bear and In six years will have paying crops of dates. They live to a much greater age than almost any other of the fruit trees, and specimens a oentury old are said to be still a good Investment The date 1» not a dry-land crop, but requires Irrigation to grow and produce fruit A plantation once established requires to be kept free of weeds, to be pollinated when the palms come Into bloom, and to have the fruit bar-

1W tJ vested when ripe. Of Insect pests ' ~lf we know too little as yet, though II the prospective planter should If count this la his -estimate of exif. pense; remembering, however, 11 that modern scientific methods have overcome the greatest fruit pests, and that these on the palm are not different in general char|Hilt// acter from those whichj are now msfS under complete control. W Very little pruning of the palms 'jjsmfll is necessary, and the harvesting is yjoßg// very simple, since the dates grow i n great bunches, which often | mu weigh from 20 to 40 pounds apiece. ||f// There are over a hundred varle Hg l ties of dates now growing in ths gw// government gardens in California jfif/ and Arizona, from which are being distributed to' prospective planters suckers as they grow. This accomplishment of the Department of Agriculture is not the re suit of any one man’s effort, but the product of at least a dozen minds working over a pe riod of 20 years and in seven different countries. There are among these hundred varieties those which candy on the tree, others which are used mainly for cooking, and some which are hard and not sticky. There are early varieties and late-ripening ones, varieties short and long, and every sort can be told by the grooves on its seeds. , The date as a delicacy Is known to every American child, but, as a food, remains to be discovered by the American public. When the date plantations of Arizona and California come Into full bearing, as they should In about ten years, the hard, dry dates, for example, now quite unknown on our markets, are sure to come into prominence and find their way to the tables of the poor as well as df the rich. The heat of our American summers Is forcing us to study the hot-weather diets of other countries, and dates are sure to become important items of food. The persimmon of the South, on which the opossum fattens, is avery different fruit from Un relative the kaki. or persimmon of the Orient, the growing of which is So great an industry in Japan as to nearly equal the Japanese orange-growing Industry In importance. Our persimmon Is a wild fruit, which wll' some day be domesticated, while the kaki has been cultivated so long that it Is represented by different forms and colors. ItArtrue that the Oriental persimmon has been gfdwn In thir country; In fact, the census records a produc tion of 68 tons; but this is scarcely a begin ntng as compared with the 194,000 tons wbicl Is tbe output of Japan. We bave misunderstood the persimmon. Our bwn wild ones we can eat only after they have been touched by the frost, and the imported Japanese ones we have left until they become soft and mushy and almost on the verge of decay. We never thought until quite recently of wondering whether in a land where the persimmon had been cultivated for Centuries they would not have worked out some artifl cial method for removing the objectionable pucker. In Japan we find this is done by packing the fruit In barrels saturated with sake, and Mr. H. C. Gore, of the Departmen' of Agriculture, Is now working out new methods of processing the Oriental persimmon, sr that It can be eaten when hard as an apple and there will no longer be any reason why i* should not take its place among the grea fruits of the country. The whole question of the improvement o' the .persimmon has been opened up, and wr are getting for this work the small-fruited spe cles called ‘lotus," from Algeria; a tropica species with white, cheese-like pulp, from Mar 11a, Mexico, Erithea, and Rhodesia; specie; from Bangalore, from Sydney, from Madras from the Nankau Pass, in China, and from tbt Caucasus. If the Oriental timber bamboo had producer seeds oftener than once In 40 years ft woulr long ago have been introduced and be no* growing In tbe South. The fact that it W to be brought over in the form of Urlnr plants, and that these'plants required spec la 7 treatment, has stood In the way of tbe quick distribution of this most important plan* throughout those portion* of America where it will grow. After several unsuccessful at tempts, a beginning has at last been made, and tbe department has a grove of Oriental »»»■ boos In northern Florida, and a search is be tag made la different parts at the world for all those species which are adapted to our climate. ’ • In this country I predict It wfi be used earliest for barrel hoops, for cheap irrigating pipes, for vine-stakes and trellises, for light ladders and stays for overloaded figrft tree* for baskets and light fruit shipping mates, and tor food. As wind-breaks and to bold eaaa l banks and 'prevent the erosion of steep bin sides, then an species which exoel all othe plants, while for light furniture and jalousie* it is sure to find a market whenever the grew