248 Report of State Board of Horticulture. 



How pleasurable the companionship of nature in her varied and inter- 

 esting processes of plant-breeding! 



With my penknife I cut a single bud from a fruit twi;j and insert it 

 under the bark of a limb of a tree bearing a different variety of fruit. The 

 bud grows and in due time produces fruit unlike the rest of the tree, but 

 like that borne on the tree from which it was taken. I continue the pro- 

 cess and insert the buds of fifty varieties on this same tree and no two 

 produce fruit alike, each variety retaining the characteristics of the tree 

 from which it was taken. 



Pray tell me what wonderful alchemy is this that takes from the earth 

 its solvent salts, carries them up to every leaf, digests, separates and re- 

 turns them to bark, fiber and fruit; paints these fifty apples in different 

 colors of green and crimson and gold, here a splash of carmine on a 

 field of yellow, there crimson stripes or dots of aureole, and greater won- 

 der yet, giving to each distinct and different flavor, aroma and season of 

 maturity. No miracle more wonderful than this of Dame Nature's in the 

 plant world. 



I take my penknife again and transfer a little grain of pollen dust from 

 the anther of a blossom to the pistil of a flower of another variety. This 

 flower matures its fruit and no marked effects are noted, but the little 

 grain of pollen has done its work and potent changes are locked up in 

 the seeds of this fruit. 



Plant these seeds, and when they have grown and blossomed and borne 

 fruit you will find in modified form the characteristics of the tree from 

 which the pollen dust was taken, and again we record a miracle. 



Pomology is largely indebted to hybridization for many of its choicest 

 varieties, but the process is a slow one and impossible to the impatient 

 man, and it is only under the intelligent and skillful manipulations of a 

 Burbank, that a Gravenstein becomes a Winterstein or a sugar prune 

 evolved that bids fair to replace the French, or some floral wonder from 

 a despised weed of the wayside. 



We want more light on this matter of cross-pollination. The literature 

 on the subject is sadly deficient, so far as practical orcharding is con- 

 cerned. Fletcher has written briefly, and we know that the Spitzenburg, 

 Winesap, Bellflower, etc., among the apples, and the Dutchess, Bartlett, 

 Clapp's Favorite, Winter Nellis, among the pears, are practically self- 

 sterile. 



But where shall I find a record of the simultaneous blossoming of trees, 

 for pollination is impossible unless stamens and pistils mature at the 

 same time? What shall I plant to fertilize my Spitzenburgs? I grow 

 Newtown Pippins, but they blossom later than the Spitzenburg. I have 

 Baldwins rich in pollen, but they bear fruit in alternate years and would 

 therefore pollinize my Spitzenburgs only every second year. I might take 

 Ben Davis, but I seek to grow apples of higher quality, and will have 

 none of it. We need light, more light on this important subject. 



I cannot pass this matter of cross-pollination, to which I have made 



