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About The Sunday Oregonian. (Portland, Ore.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (April 5, 1908)
THE SUNDAY OREGONIAN. PORTLAND. APRIL 5, 1909. 3 EblBlyf CACTUS TMAZT TTZOMlSES '7S 07' ACRCS .ATMD FURNISH FOOD FOR-, .I TJ 1 i i . i ri AVEGKTABLB that grows fruit This la the evolution of the thorn leas cactus Produced by that wizard of plant life. I,uthcr Burbank. of Santa Kosa. Cal. The thornless cactus lie regards as his greatest triumph. 1 believes It will prove one of the greatest blessings modern science has given to mankind. He believes it will do a great deal to solve the problem of food for livestock anil that it will prove of In estimable value as a hygienic food 'for man. The (hornless cactus is a proved suc cess. At a mode nursery, established for the purpose of propagating this new and wonderful plant, near lndio. in the Sal ton Sea district, there are now l?O0 growing flourishing plants. Hy Spring of l-XW there wilt be half a million plants, and the distribution or them to satisfy the demand throughout the country will thfn begin. Within IS months it is con fidently expected, many thousands of acres adjacent to ios Angeles will be planted In thornlcss cactus. Within five years, the cactus enthusiasts prophesy, all the land now planted -to wheat or barley or alfalfa will be growing1 thorn leas cactus. Those critics mho have accused Mr. Burbank of claiming to have produced something already in existence do not know whereof they speak. Mr. Burbank does not assert that he produced the thornlcss or spineless cactus; he con cedes that IwolAted Individual plants t ithout thorns wore found In Arizona, In Texas. In Southern California. Aus tralia and various parts of the world. What he has produced is a t hornless cactus which is of inestimable value as forage and as food for man and which will come true, that is. thornless, from graft. In other words, he has. hy 12 years of patient, laborious experiment at Inn and selection, produced several varieties of cactus which. reproducing from the leaves broken off and thrust Into the ground, will come true, that is, spine less, through succeeding generations, and will yield an almost unh.'lievahle. amount of food ami fodder. Here are tome figures: The 3-year-old thornlcss cactus plant stands six feet high, is six feet in di ameter and weighs .VW pounds. An acre of such plants will yiM tons of for age each year and 10 to : tons of deli cious fruit, which, workers on Mr. Pur bank's experimental farm declare. Is bet ter than apples, oranges, peaches or pears. ( actus as Forage and I'rutt. Pour tons of cactus fodder is equivalent In fecdlnr value to one ton of alfalfa: hence 2rt tons of cactus equals 50 tons of alfalfa. It follows, then, that if Mr. Fwrhank production is all that Is claimed for it, one acre of land will pro duce as much fodder, actual feeding val ue. In thornless caetus, as would four acres of alfalfa, for a crop of 124 tons of alfalfa to the acre is exceptionally good. Moreover, the cactus may be gTown on land which will not grow alfalfa. Some varieties of the thornless plant are ex pected to grow with no Irrigation what ever: others will require a little water. Hurbank believes that three billion acres of unproductive soil throughout the world may be made productive by the thorn less cactus. Hut this Is not all. The 10 to 20 tons of fruit which may he taken from the cac t 'is plant per acre per year has A de cided commercial and economic value. The fruit may be pickled, canned, pre served or used for the making of syrups. It will find a ready market in the fresh state, and is expected to supplant many popular fruits In the fancy of epicures. Th leaves of the cactus plant may be us-ed with advantage and keen enjoy ment as a food for man. Boiled as greens, fried as egg .plant, or served as lettuce or a salad, it is said to be de lectable. The claim is made that the leaf of the thornless cactus is of more food value than any other vegetable that grows, be cause it supplies In greater quantity than any other the organic minerals and salts mar-ganese. Iron, potassium, magnesium and sodium which are needed to build up the nerve cells. Value in Mineral Salts. Among Burbank's assistants in the propagation of the thornless cactus is Lr. K. N". Doud. of I,os Angeles, who has charge of the Thornless Cactus Farming Company, to which Burbank has entrust ed all his perfected plants, together with the responsibility of propagating each variety and eventually distributing them to the world. Dr. Doud is an enthusiast on the subject of the cactus's food value. He has made a careful study of its prop erties, and by chemical analysis has prov en that It is rich In those organic salts which he says are so sadly needed in the daily diet of the average human being. "Most of the diseases of the flesh." said' Dr. Doud. "are due to the excessive acid ity of the body. The acids which are taken into the system in such large quan tities tear down and destroy the cells. It has been proved that the salts four in meats and medicines will not neutralize th acid in the nerve cells though It will In the blood. The cactus contains 4 to 5 per cent of these priceless organic salts. "Another remarkable peculiarity about the spineless cactus, as Professor Bur bank has developed ft, is that the fruit is absolutely starch less. What this means to man and beast any student of dietetics will understand. "An acre of thornless cactus will sup port five to ten dairy cows. Hogs and sheep do splendidly upon it. Cactus will take the place of alfalfa. While, because of the large percentage of water it con tains, we have to allow four tons of cac tus to equal one of alfalfa In feeding value, yet we must at the same time ad mit that In other respects the four tons of cactus will contain more real nutriment for the cow or horse than one ton of al falfa. Probably no more convincing state ment may be made In regard to this than that the Government experts have found the thornless cactus superior to sorghum hay for dairy cattle' Perfecting the Individual. Dr. Doud spoke interestingly of Profes sor Burbank's work and of his philosophy. "Professor Burbank," said he, "believes that In human life and plant life, the ef forts of the philanthropist and the scien tist should be devoted to the perfecting of the Individual. He holds that any effort toward raising the masses Is lost unless It is directly applied to the individual. I have known Professor Burbank to grow a thousand young trees and destroy of them because he could not afford to devote his time to caring for them. Philo sophically, he concluded it a wiser thing to take the one tree out of the thousand which more nearly approached perfection and toll with It, to the end that the per fect thing for which he was striving might be attained. "It was thus with his experiments with the cactus. Out of thousands and thou sands of plants. Professor Burbank, after years of painstaking experimentation, se lected only a few. The remainder he de stroyed. The propagation of the superior individual; that Is his theory and his rule of action. "Professor Burbank believes that sci ence may achieve the triumph of manipu lating the organic forces of nature just as it has done with the unorganized forces. Steam and electricity are the best exam ples of what has been done in the latter direction. The perfected fruits and plants of the last generation are but forecasts i of what may be done In the former. "The great pressure of the present age Is to get food for man and beast from the soil. In & few years the matter of lum ber supply may supersede this In impor tance, but there Is no question that today the greatest problem is that of cheap and plentiful supply of foodstuffs and feed. There are. Professor Burbank estimates. 3.000,000,000 acres of unproductive land In the world today unproductive largely for lack of moisture. He believes that even tually the thornless cactus will be grow able on this waste soil. The desert is the home of the cactus. It will take the moisture from the air where no rain falls. It will grow where no other vegetation grows. It may be made to grow in many climates and under innumerable climatic conditions." Professor Burbank Is still experimenting with the cactus, though he has perfected no less than seven varieties. He hopes to get a plant which will grow In colder climates, even in Minnesota. Wisconsin and North Dakota. Some of the farie ties he has already produce? will stand 5 to 10 degrees of freezing. , What Has Been Done on a Desert. The Thornless Cactus Farming Com pany of Los Angeles, which has charge of the work of propagating the perfected species, produces some interesting figures on the rapidity of growth of the plant. The single leaf of the cactus, dried and thrust Into the ground, will In three months produce five to ten slabs or leaves, and each of these slabs will grow three to five more in another two months. Bach of these leaves will weigh two to three pounds. In the case of the opuntias, one of the best of the Burbank productions, the .plant Is all practically food and drink from root to tip, and Is greatly relished by all herbivorous animals from the canary bird to the elephant. Each year the productiveness of the plant increases. It multiplies with amazing rapidity, as witnessed by the fact that the 1300 plants now flourishing at lndio are expected to produce nearly half a million plants by next Spring. In the Bast, where the Winter cold Is severe enough to kill the plant If left out of doors, the leaves may be cut off and stored and planted again in the Spring, yielding an average crop of 75 tons per acre. It is one of the pe culiarities of the thornless cactus that the leaf must be dried before being planted. .While some have seen fit to scoff at the latest Burbank triumph, there can be no argument that it Is the greatest of all bus marvelous accomplishments. The thornless cactus, if it has not yet arrived. Is rapidly arriving. The United States Government has conducted extensive ex periments and has cordially indorsed tha plant as a potent agent In the reclama tion of the desert and in the solutffm of cheap and abundant food for livestock. Xot Purchasable Today. Today the thornless cactus Is practically unpurchasable. Professor Burbank sold five leaves to an Australian company for Jiooo each, with tho proceeds of which sale he has built his new bungalow at tfanta Rosa. His old home Is now called the pumping station, because It Is here that his historians manage to entice him awav from his work a couple of hours a day to get from him the Information they must have to complete the several t books about his life and work now being prepared. A few leaves were sold In thla country at JoOO each. But the plant Is not on the market and will not be till next Spring, 199. when !t is expected thre will be sufficient plants to satisfy the immediate demand. Then the thorn less cactus will take its place among th great fruitgrowing plants of the world. Already numerous companies and colonic are being organized to grow this remark able production. The La Prosperldad Colony Association, the Los Angeles or ganization which is preparing to settle) 500.000 acres of the richest land in Lower California, expects to set aside a large; tract of land to the growing of thornless cactus. Ranchers, cattle -raisers and farmers are putting in their applications for a supply of the plants at $2 apieea when the distribution shall begin next Spring. Professor Burbank and Dr. Doud expect the next three years to demon strate all and more than has been claimed for this, the greatest of all th Burbank triumphs. Ios Angeles. March 30. Overheating in Automobiles Due to Carelessness BY K. A. GRANT, M. E. NO DETAIL of an automobile has been given more careful attention and more thought by designers than the cool ing system, and It is not making too strong a statement to say that nowa days In ninety-nine cases-out of a hun dred, when the motor of a car overheats, it is due to the carelessness of the op erator rather than any Inherent defect in the cooling system. The cooling problem has been studied, not only by automobile designers, but by the manufacturers of radiators as well. Occasionally an automobile is found which does not cool, because of some fundamental defect In the system, but this now is an exception In a modern motor car. Probably not more than 20 per cent of the heat-units generated perform actual work In driving the car, while of the re maining 80. perhaps 50 per cent have to be taken up by the cooling system, leav ing only 30 per cent to go out from the exhaust; in other words, more than dou ble the amount of horsepower is ab sorbed by the radiator than Is used In driving the car. Assuming, then, that an engine is prop erly designed, let us Investigate the causes of overheating. A gasoline motor obtains its power from tho Ignition of a charge of air and gasoline vapor, or, in other words, there is too little air and too much gasoline, the result is the mix ture ignites slowly and burns not only during the power stroke, but also during the exhaust stroke. The hot gases are therefore carried back and expelled through the exhaust, with the result that the cylinder walls become overheated, causing the water to boll. Tho remedy In this case is to decrease the quantity of gasoline until a perfect mixture re sults. Another common cause of overheating may be due either to the quantity or quality of lubricating oil. It is unfor tunate, but nevertheless true, that there Is much poor oil put upon the market. Many an oil that will lubricate efficiently when the engine is workln-g under a light load may prove worthless and pos cess little lubricating value when under a full load. In other words, the tem perature that the cylinder obtains limits the value of the lubricating qualities of the oil. If, therefore, a motor when cool gives Its full amount of power, and this power gradually falls oft when run for some time with throttle. In ninety-nine times out of a hundred the trouble Is due to the quality or the quantity of the oil Poor circulation Is due either to a de fective pump or to some stoppage in tna water system, and this may also be re sponsible for overheating. While pump troubles were common four or five years back, the modern centrifugal pump Is productive of very little annoyance. In my estimation, the automobile of to day is thoroughly standard, and when trouble arises it Is due to lack of Intelli gent care rather than any inherent defect in the car itself. From The Circle. Gone. She wnt away from me, and never mon Will her light foot fall on my lonely floor: The nerfume of her presence lingers yet Kaeh day, each hour forbids me to forest Her err My throne, now that her reign 1 o'er. Oh, to call back my word?: Oh. to restore The old ways! Oh, to be ust a of yore! Oh, bitter days! Oh. night of vain regret! She went iway! Today I stand before another's door To see If he will come, for dollars four A week, and be my cook. Ay. but I'll bet Hhe cannot wear old Midget's coronet Or make the kind of pies she made before Sh wnt away! V Cleveland leader.
