US Plant Patent PP4053
Plum tree
PUBLIC DOMAIN
Patent expired May 10, 1994. This plant is in the public domain — anyone may propagate and sell it.
Twenty years from the filing date would end on April 22, 1996, but this patent ends 713 days earlier — a terminal disclaimer gives term back. A source that calculates twenty years from filing would tell you this plant is still protected when it is already free.
The record
- Patent number
- PP4053
- Filed
- April 22, 1976
- Granted
- May 10, 1977
- Expires
- May 10, 1994
- Assignee
- STARK BRO 3 S NURSERIES & ORCH
- Inventor
- ALDRICH SUSAN A
No cultivar name of record
This patent does not name the plant, and for its era that is ordinary rather than an omission. Before about 1980, breeders frequently patented a plant without giving it a cultivar name at all — the grant identified it by its number, its parentage and a written description of the flower and foliage. Most plant patents from the 1930s to the 1970s have no name in them.
Nothing here is missing from our records: the patent itself states no name. Where one exists we show it, and we do not invent one.
Abstract
This invention relates to a new and distinct variety of plum tree which most nearly resembles the "Italian Prune" tree (unpatented). In contrast to this known tree the new variety has (a) resistance to fungal and bacterial leaf spots, (b) a more spreading growth habit, (c) larger fruit, and (d) earlier ripening fruit.
Show the legal claimThe single numbered claim as granted — the legal text that defines what this patent covers.
Having thus described and illustrated my new variety of plum tree, what is claimed as new and desired to be secured by Letters Patent is: 1. A new and distinct variety of plum tree, substantially as illustrated and described, which most nearly resembles the "Italian Prune" tree (unpatented), but from which it is distinguished by resistance to fungal and bacterial leaf spots, a more spreading growth habit, larger fruit, and earlier ripening fruit.
Read the full patent: US Plant Patent PP4053 in full — the complete specification, every figure, and the file history.