I have just returned from a visit to one of the most wonderful private experiment farms in America. I should like to have had a picked group of scientific horticulturists with me. They would have seen more than I saw, and would have understood more completely the astonishing work that is being done year after year in this outdoor garden in which new flowers, fruits, and ornamental plants are being created chiefly for the pleasure of the hybridizer's art—a garden wherein allied species of plants are knit closer or are broken into new forms of vegetable life by the magic of pollen dust and a thousand persuasions of culture.
There is hardly a nurseryman, seedsman, florist, or botanist of reputation in the United States who does not know something of the marvels produced in the gardens of this horticultural
wondersmith, Luther Burbank, who has been toiling for more than twenty years to make new combinations in the vegetable world. He began at the age of sixteen, in his native state of Massachusetts, and his later results, in lilies, gladioli, berries, plums, quinces, and other fruits, are of world-wide fame. Here in California Mr. Burbank is almost unknown, so modest and secluded a life has be lived, apart from men, seeking silence, and avoiding notoriety as though it were a pestilence. He has few visitors, and none who are uninvited ever see his experiment field. Living ten miles from some of his plantations, he is up at daybreak, and out till long after dark overseeing his workmen.
His life is that of the ardent specialist, who never finds time for a moment's rest or recreation.
His most attractive line of work at
present is in lilies, which are now in full bloom. I spent several hours in the
lily field of two acres, containing not less than 100,000 plants of hybrid
lilies, raised from seed. Fully as many small plants are growing in seed-boxes
for planting out this winter. Sixteen years ago Mr. Burbank began to experiment
with the native lilies of the Pacific Coast. He gradually added other species,
gathering the pollen, and cross-fertilizing, until this magnificent collection
is the result, or rather is the beginning of entirely new classes of this
beautiful flower. Mr. Burbank has grown more than a million lily bulbs, and be
plants hybridized seed by the pound every year. Among the leading kinds of
lilies which he has endeavored to unite in countless combinations are all the
Japanese species, such as L. speciosum and L. auratum; the Himalayan lilies,
the European lilies, such as L. candidum; the lovely yellow L. Parryii, the
pretty dwarfs, L. maritimum and L . parvum, and others too many to list here,
but numbering more than forty in all.
This great mass of a hundred thousand
lilies in full bloom, on a California hillside, in mid June, surrounded by
orchards, wheatfields, snd fringes of forest, is peculiarly enchanting. As one
approaches, the golden, orange, and red tints which predominate, mingled with
varied shades of green, produce the effect of some huge product of Oriental looms.
Little by little, as one draws closer, the colors separate, and widely diverse
types of flowers are seen to be growing side by side. One finds lily stems
varying In height from Six inches to nine feet, all bearing open flowers. Some
plants have many stems, others but one, and a few present stems with distinct branches
like the branches of a tree. Flowers, leaves, stems, and roots show every
conceivable variation. The biologist would find material for a volume, in this
lily field.
line of work at present i s in lilies, which are now in full bloom.
I spent several hours In the lily field of two acres, containing not leas than
luo.OOO plants of hybrid lilies, raised from seed. Fully us many email plants
are growing in seed-boxes for planting out this winter. Sixteen years ago Mr.
Burbank began to experiment with the native lilies of the Pacific Coast. He
gradually added other species, gathering the pollen, and cross-fertilizing,
until this magnificent collection is the result, or rather is the beginning of
entirely new classes of this beautiful flower. Mr. Burbank has grown more than a
million lily bulbs, and be plants hybridized seed by the pound every year.
Among the leading kinds of lilies which he has endeavored t o unite in
countless combinations are all the Japanese species, such as L. speoiosum and
L. auratum; the Himalaya.! lilies, the European lilies, such as L. candidum;
the lovely yellow L. Parryii, the pretty dwarfs, L. maritimum and L . parvum,
and others too many to list here, but numbering more than forty in all. This
great mass of a hundred thousand lilies in full bloom, on a California hillside,
in mid June, surrounded by orchards, wheatfields, snd fringes of forest, is
peculiarly enchanting. As one approaches, the golden, orange, and red tints
which predominate, mingled with varied shades of green, produce the effect of
some huge product of Oriental looms. Little by little, aa one draws closer, the
colors separate, and widely diverse types of flowers are seen to be growing
side by side. One flnrta, lily stems varying In height from Six inches to n i n
e feet, all bearing open flowers. Some plan’s have many stems, ethers but one,
and a few present stems with distinct branches like the branches of a tree.
Flowers, leaves, stems, and roots show every conceivable variation. The
biologist would find material for a volume, in this lily field.line of work at
present i s in lilies, which are now in full bloom. I spent several hours In
the lily field of two acres, containing not leas than luo.OOO plants of hybrid
lilies, raised from seed. Fully us many email plants are growing in seed-boxes for
planting out this winter. Sixteen years ago Mr. Burbank began to experiment
with the native lilies of the Pacific Coast. He gradually added other species,
gathering the pollen, and cross-fertilizing, until this magnificent collection
is the result, or rather is the beginning of entirely new classes of this
beautiful flower. Mr. Burbank has grown more than a million lily bulbs, and be
plants hybridized seed by the pound every year. Among the leading kinds of
lilies which he has endeavored t o unite in countless combinations are all the
Japanese species, such as L. speoiosum and L. auratum; the Himalaya.! lilies,
the European lilies, such as L. candidum; the lovely yellow L. Parryii, the
pretty dwarfs, L. maritimum and L . parvum, and others too many to list here,
but numbering more than forty in all. This great mass of a hundred thousand lilies
in full bloom, on a California hillside, in mid June, surrounded by orchards,
wheatfields, snd fringes of forest, is peculiarly enchanting. As one
approaches, the golden, orange, and red tints which predominate, mingled with
varied shades of green, produce the effect of some huge product of Oriental looms.
Little by little, aa one draws closer, the colors separate, and widely diverse
types of flowers are seen to be growing side by side. One flnrta, lily stems
varying In height from Six inches to n i n e feet, all bearing open flowers. Some
plan’s have many stems, ethers but one, and a few present stems with distinct branches
like the branches of a tree. Flowers, leaves, stems, and roots show every
conceivable variation. The biologist would find material for a volume, in this
lily field.
Here are a few notes from my field-book: ’There ia overy shape among the flowers. Some lilies have
but one petal, rolled like a cigar, and half open like the broader end of a cypripedium.
Others bave two petals spreading apart like wings; others, again, bave three or
four or five petals. Tho great bulk, however, have the normal six. The variation
in color is extreme, ranging from white to dark-purple, through surprising changes
of combinations. The methods of growth are equally curious. Many stems bear all
the flowers at the top, almost level, a new system for lilies, and especially
useful in garden-grouping. One such plant two and a half feet high carries
fifty-six flowers.
“A tall spike of golden-brown lilies of L. Humboldti type
carries ninety-one flowers and is four feet high.
“Some crosses of Lilium
Parryii on L. Humboldti show an immense improvement in size and dignity over
both parents. Many dwarf plants, L. maritimum stock, are especially attractive. These are chiefly crossed with L. pardalinum minor. One small plant
has eighty-eight flowers.
“A candelabra-shaped, branching lily, with eight
stems coming from one bulb, shows 217 buds and flowers. This is a very
remarkable type, new and most
attractive. It seems to have the root and leaf characteristics of the hardy
white lily of the garden, L. candidum. Many combinations of this general class
are found with flowers of different colors. The finest plant has thirty-seven
stems, and here the candidum cross shows very plainly.”
In form, sire, color,
fragrance, this field of hybridised lily flowers is a revelation. There ‘is
certainly nothing like it elsewhere in America, and 1 do not know of any place
in Europe where such a collection can be found. We came out of the field yellow
and brown from head to feet with lily-pollen.
Lilies do not readily hybridise,
or “break” into new lines of development. Comparatively little has been done
in the line of producing new lilies anywhere for twenty years past. The
attention of hybridizers has been turned elsewhere, because lilies are
distinctly difficult subjects. But now, by handling them on so large a scale,
under very favorable conditions of soil and climate, Mr. Burbank has not only
created a number of fine new varieties worthy of general propagation, and capable of adding unthought-of charms to the hardy-bulb garden; he has also
produced an almist limitless mass of promising materials for other hybridizers and florists to work upon. The tendency to break into sports and variations predominates in his lily strain. It ia capable of guidance into new
channels; it has only begun to produce varieties worth propagation.
So much for
the lilies The berry plantations are
oo lees marvellous. Over 70,000 seedlings were once grown here is trying to produce
a aeeful cross, and all bat a dosea were destroyed. The best of these, after
repeated tests and the introduction of new strains, ia a berry which combine*
the rirhasea sttd sweetness of t h i wild California dewberry (RvtniM wrvfea)
with some of the charneterlstioa of the best raspberries. This i s mcch like
the Loganberry which ins California Bait Station introduced, bat It seems to Among
other new berrlea are a blackberry,rich and beautiful,and and fine yellow,
white, and The golden May berry, a cross with a wild Japanese berry, ripens a
month earlier than the earliest variety before known, Aa with the lilies,
success with the berry field i s based upon a superb collection o f varieties aad
species of berries from all parts of the world, and t o a s of cross-bred
plants are destroyed as worthless. Often the end aimed at proves unattainable,
at least under present conditions,snd nature gives some other and totally
unexpected gift instead.
“What do you expect to achieve with all this?” 1 ask
the eager, busy, faithful master.
“Fairer flowers and better fruits.” be
answers. “Fruits and flowers for the homes of America—earlier and later, larger
and more highly flavored, hardier and more productive.”
Every day be does the
work of two or three ordinary men, and every day be wrestles with problems of
life, until be forces answers from the very lips of the Sphinx.
