EFFORTS TO INCREASE FOOD RESOURCES 



But Saunders was not discouraged. He knew how to 

 combine size from one fruit with hardiness from another 

 by crossbreeding and selection. If it worked with goose- 

 berries, why wouldn't it work with wheat? The first 

 crosses were made at the Central Experimental Farm at 

 Ottawa in 1888, using the imported plants from India 

 and Russia with the locally grown Fife. Busy with ad- 

 ministrative details, he employed his two sons, Charles and 

 Arthur, to help him, along with J. L. McMurray and 

 W. T. Macoun. Cross-pollinations were made at Brandon 

 and Indian Head in Saskatchewan and at Agassiz in British 

 Columbia. The crossed seeds or their progeny were later 

 assembled at Ottawa, where the task of selecting and 

 comparing the new plants was begun. 



William Saunders knew how to work with vegetatively 

 propagated fruits. When he found a plant that he liked, all 

 he had to do was to root cuttings, and the new variety, 

 when tested, was ready to distribute. Each plant remained 

 true to type. The seed-propagated wheat was a different 

 problem, as he soon found out. The generations following 

 the cross were bewildering. No two plants were alike. 

 An early selection of one year ripened late the next. Little 

 dwarfs grew mixed with tall stems, and red and white 

 kernels came from seed all selected for one color. 



Before 1900 there was no exact knowledge about the 

 behavior of hybrids. The best procedure to get them fixed 

 in type, so that they would produce a uniform crop year 

 after year, was not understood. But soon after 1900, Mendel's 

 experiments became known. Nilsson, in Sweden, had shown 

 the best way to purify a mixed variety of wheat and other 

 self-fertilized plants by the progeny performance record. 



In 1903 Charles Saunders, son of William, was placed in 

 charge of the cereal investigations in Canada. Trained in 

 the methods of science at Johns Hopkins, he went at the 

 wheat breeding program from a new viewpoint and with 



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