EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 



617 



A bushel distributed in 1912 was placed in the hands of a Jackson county 

 farmer, a member of the Michigan Crop Improvement Association, wKo 

 planted it away from other rye, on an acre of ground. This yielded thirty- 

 five bushels in 1913. Soon the whole country-side around Parma in western 

 Jackson county, and around Albion in eastern Calhoun county grew Rosen 

 rye as a winter crop, and little or no wheat. Other counties took it up and 

 with the aid of the Michigan Crop Improvement Association and active 

 county agricultural agents, the new rye spread rapidly. In 1917, St. Jo- 

 seph county had 3,500 acres, Jackson county had 2,000 acres, and the whole 

 state of Michigan, about 15,000 acres. Thus it took four more years for 

 the new variety to attract the notice and confidence necessary to create 

 a demand for pedigreed seed. In 1920, Michigan for the first time exceeded 

 any other state in the Union in rye production. Without doubt the extensive 

 planting of Rosen rye has had much to do in placing the state first in rye 

 growing. 



RYE OPEN FERTILE. 



Rye is naturally a wind pollinated plant. The head contains four rows 

 of flowers in groups of twos, on alternate sides of the flat end of the stem, 

 called the rachis. Each of these flowers contains a one seeded ovary and three 

 very large anthers. The anthers open at the end and shatter the pollen 

 out into the air. This is normally done without allowing any of the pollen 



Figure No. 2. The two heads ia the center are Rosen rye. Common rye Is shown at the left and 

 a cross between common and Rosen at the right. In each case a side and an edge viev/ is shown. 

 Note the good filling of the Rosen in comparison with the common crossed rye. 



to fall back into the flower. Thus it happens that the flowers are normally 

 cross pollinated. It is the pollen that is blown over from another plant 

 that enters the flower and fertilizes the ovule. 



For this reason it happens that many flowers fail to be pollinated. Their 

 own pollen is shoved out and blown away, the flowers are not open long 

 enough to catch other pollen, or the small quantity of pollen, that enters, 



