460 Agricultural Gazette of N.S.W. [July 2, 1920. 



twelve inches higher than the niotlier crop, and its progeny next year varied 

 greatly in type : none, however, was as tall as the original. From Zealand, 

 which has tapering white ears, a brown-eared plant was taken, the progeny 

 of which yielded some plants with awns and others awnless. Federation has 

 thrown variations in the shape and colour of the ear, the presence or absence 

 of awn, and the appearance of the grain. 



It is often possible to make a guess at the pai-entage which is not 

 likely to be wide of the mark. For instance, we have a natui-al cross from 

 Hard Federation which produced twenty-six brown-eared, eighty pale brown 

 and twenty-nine white-eared plants. They were all tip-awned, and the grain 

 varied in plumpness, density, and translucency. The brown-eared progeny 

 resembled Hard Federation and the white-eared Marshall's No. 3. A variant 

 from a fixed crossbi'ed with large soft grain showed grain of a rather smaller 

 and more rounded type, like Hard Federation. A similar character was 

 seen in an individual taken from Field Marshall, which has soft large grain. 



It is our custom to sow varieties under test in alternate rows with Hard 

 Federation, repeating the series three times. A bufier is thus provided on 

 either side of each variety, giving as nearly as possible uniform conditions 

 for its development. By using a variety which has proved itself a suitable 

 and profitable one for the district, we may reasonably expect that as a large 

 proportion of any natural crosses that may occur will have this wheat for 

 one parent, useful varieties may be pioduced. 



It will be evident from the foregoing that care must be taken in the 

 growing of seed wheat. By raising pedigree seed in nursery rows, starting 

 with individual plants sown one grain at a time by hand, one is able to 

 detect any differences that may occur in the plants. If this process is kept 

 up, only mixing the produce of single plants when sowing lai-ger bulks, the 

 farmer need have no fear of a variety becoming mixed or deteriorating from 

 natural crossing ; but, as soon as a wheat is grown for a fev/ seasons without 

 regard to individual selection, th^re will be variations in the crop. Mechanical 

 admixture from machines, bags, &c., probably accounts largely for the 

 impure state of the seed wheat on many farms, but we are not infrequently 

 confronted with a sample of wheat to be named, which we cannot identify 

 with any of our cultivated varieties. Often these are cases of natural cross- 

 fertilisation. 



We have not studied the occurrence of natural crossing with regard to 

 climatic conditions, but Mr. C. R. Ball, the agronomist in charge of 

 western wheat investigations in the United States of America, writes, in 

 January, 1916 : — 



This phenomenon occurs rather commonly in some sections of the United States. 

 This country may be separated roughly into four divisions, on a basis of climate. 



!. The humid division, extending from the Atlantic coast to an irregular line some 

 300 or 400 miles west of the Mississippi .... This division grows soft or semi- 

 hard red winter wheats almost exclusively, with the exception of the extreme north-west 

 corner, where, in Minnesota and part of Iowa, hard red spring wheats predominate. 



2. The Great Plains area, lying between the humid division and the Rocky Mountains 

 and extending northward into Alberta and Saskatchewan, in Canada. This division 

 grows haid red winter wheats of the Turkey or Crimean group in its central portions, 

 and hard spring wheats (including durums), in the north. 



