EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 279 



upon the supposed better corn of the breeding plot. If, however, some 

 neighbor is growing another breed of corn near by this southwest cor- 

 ner, it will not be desirable to use this corner for the breeding plot, 

 because pollen from the neighbor's corn is likely to be blown into it. 



At ripening time the few best ears of this plot are selected, as before 

 described, for next year's breeding plot, while other good ears should 

 be saved for a general seed plot in the field for next year. Or, if this 

 breeding plot be of considerable size, it might be possible to select seed 

 enough for planting the whole field next year. This plan has been prac- 

 ticed in Michigan with good success. 



(lb) Instead of mixing the corn from the several ears, the corn 

 from each ear might be sown in a row or block by itself in the breeding 

 plot. This gives a chance to study the progeny of each ear by itself 

 and to select the best of the progeny of the best ears. There arises the 

 diflQculty in this plan, that the best ear in any row planted from the 

 best ear, may be the product of the crossing of the pollen from a row 

 planted from a very poor ear, as shown by its "performance," upon this 

 row planted from the best ear. ' 



CROSS-FERTILIZING. 



(2a) Two ears of apparently good quality may be selected for cross- 

 breeding, and with the idea of breeding ear No. 2 on ear No. 1. A block 

 of land, say five rods by three rods, may be laid off and marked. In 

 rows 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11 and 13 the grain from ear No. 1 is planted, while 

 in the even-numbered rows — 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 and 14 — the grain from ear 

 No. 2 is planted. At tasseling time the tassels are removed from the 

 odd numbered rows as rapidly as they begin to appear. The ears form- 

 ing on the stalks of the odd rows must be pollinated by pollen from the 

 even-numbered rows. The matured ears on the Odd rows are seen to 

 be the result of cross-fertilization — are the progeny of the crossing of 

 ear No. 2 upon ear No. 1. 



Prof. Williams, of the Ohio Experiment Station, very wisely calls 

 attention to the fact that the productive qualities of these two ears so 

 crossed the one upon the other were not known. He practices the 

 following method : 



(2b) After selecting ears from the field as described above, a part, 

 less than half, only of the grain from each ear is planted in rows as 

 described in (lb). The remaining portion of grain of each ear is care- 

 fully saved. The crops from the several rows so planted indicate the 

 productiveness and quality of the corresponding ears, and it is thus pos- 

 sible to tell which of these ears are n-iore promising, and that portion 

 of the grain from these ears which was saved, can now be planted in 

 the blocks as described in (2a), thus crossing strong ears upon strong 

 ears of known productiveness and quality. Ears from these crosses 

 may be tested and crossed in like manner, and so on, as far as the 

 breeder cares to carry on the work. 



The value of such a system of cross-breeding is twofold : 



(1) Cross-fertilizing of plants should result in increased vigor; and 



(2) The bringing together of plants from ears selected for proven 

 strong qualities ought to produce even greater vigor. 



Do not be surprised or disappointed if the ears obtained immediately 

 from this cross-pollenating are small or poorly filled. 



