556 Agricultural Experiment Station, Ithaca, N. Y. 



No. 1. 

 DEC. 1, 1896. 



TEACHER'S LEAFLETS 



FOR USE IN THE RURAL SCHOOLS 



PREPARED BY 



THE AGRICULTUEAL EXPERIMENT STATION 

 OF CORNELL UNIVERSITY, 



ITHACA, N. Y. 

 Issued under the auspices 

 of the Expei Jmeut Station 

 Extension, or > ixou Law. 

 By L. H. Bailey. 



HOW A SQUASH PLANT GETS OUT OF THE SEED. 



BY L. H. BAILEY. 



If one were to plant seeds of a Hubbard or Boston 

 Marrow Squash in loose warm earth in a pan or box^ 

 and were then to leave the parcel for a week or ten 

 days, he would find, upon his return, a (polony of plants 

 like that shown in Fig. 1. If he had not planted the 

 seeds himself or had not seen such plants before, he 

 would not believe that these curious plants would ever 

 grow into squash vines, so different are they from the 

 vines which we know in the garden. This, itself, is a 

 most curious fact — this wonderful difference between 

 the first and the later stages of all plants, and it is only 

 because we know it so well that we do not wonder 



1. Squash plant at it. 

 a week old. 



It may happen, however,^ — as it did in a pan of seeds which I 

 sowed a few days ago — that one or two of the plants may look 

 like that shown in Fig. 2. Here the seed seems to have come 

 up on top of the plant, and one is reminded of the curious way 

 in which beans come up on the stalk of the 3'oung plant. If we 

 were to study the matter, however, — as w^e may do at a future 

 time, — we should find a great difference in the ways in which the 

 squashes and the beans raise their seeds out of the ground. It 

 is not our purpose to compare the squash and the beau at this 

 time, but we are curious to know why one of these squash plants 

 brings its seed up out of the ground whilst all the others do not. 



Note. — These leaflets are intended for the teacher, not for the scholars. 

 It is their purpose to snsiaest the method which a teacher may pursue in 

 instructin.ijc cliildren ar odd times in nalure-stndj'. The teacher should 

 show the children the objects themselves — should plant the seeds, raise 

 the plants, collect the insects, etc.; or, better, he should interest the chil- 

 dren to collect the objects. Advanced pupils, however, may be given 

 tiie leaflets and nslced to i)erform the experimenrs or make the observa- 

 tions whicli are su?:c:estcd. The scholars themselves should be taught 

 to do the work and to arrive at independent conclusions. Teachers who 

 desire to inform themselves more fully upon the motives of this nature- 

 study teaching, slioidd write for a copy of Bulletin 122, of the Cornell 

 Experiment Station, Itliacn, N. Y. 



