400 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



Pollen Influence. — Among all the conflicting testimony concerning the 

 influence of pollen upon the pulp and fruit of the strawberry, we have gleaned 

 the following item from a talk by Prof. T. V. Munson of Texas. He said: 



It was the placenta that was influenced by contact with the male fertilizing 

 properties, whether plants or animals were considered. It was a well estab- 

 lished physiological fact, with which poultry breeders were familiar, that the 

 first mate of a pullet so influenced the reproductive organs, and that all future 

 progeny resembled him, although another cock was used of an entirely distinct 

 breed. In strawberries, the placenta was the *pulpy portion, and might be 

 greatly influenced by the pollen. In melons, the edible portion was closely 

 connected with the p'acenta, or that portion to which the seeds were attacned, 

 and might also reasonably be thought susceptible to change. The fruit or pulp 

 of apples and pears was an enlargement of the calyx — a part of the flower three 

 removes from the seed — and in this case quite unlikely to be influenced by the 

 pollen or male property. 



Eating Strawberries. — Chas. A. Green makes a good case for the straw- 

 berry in the following: 



When I was a boy my people used to buy strawberries. I hear much about 

 buying instead of raising them. My people leaned towards that opinion and 

 thought it was cheaper to buy. Their purchase for the family of seven persons 

 for the entire season consisted of 20 quarts. Were these eaten fresh with all 

 the choice flavor tickling the palate? No. None were to be eaten at that sea- 

 son of the year. They were all poured into a kettle, and simmered over a slow 

 fire, and corked up in tight cans, where us poor children could not even get a 

 smell at them. In the dead of the winter when no one thought of strawberries, 

 the cans, after long intervals, were opened in the presence of assembled guests, 

 but alas they were no longer strawberries, but a base counterfeit, shrunken and 

 misshappen, flavorless and insipid monstrosities floating about in a pink sea. 

 I hope that none of our readers give their children grief by making such use of 

 strawberries. When fresh picked and quickly eaten, the strawberry is a straw- 

 berry. Its destiny is to furnish the system with the needed medicine at that 

 particular season of the year when it ripens. It is an outrage to deprive your 

 families then, with a view to bottling them for winter guests. I have no sym- 

 pathy with people who talk about buying strawberries in place of raising them. 

 It is a foolish pretext indulged in by hypocrites, who never intend to buy berries 

 in sufficient quantities for the entire family to indulge in with freedom. Why, 

 a family of seven persons could consume in one strawberry season, ten or twenty 

 bushels of berries. Have those who think of buying berries instead of growing 

 them any idea of buying from ten to twenty bushels of strawberries for their 

 families? No; hardly as many quarts. I am not writing this to create ademand 

 for more strawberries in the market. Nature has provided this fruit with 

 charms that require no outside encouragement to entice people to eat them. 

 You will see that I am a friend of the strawberry. It is, indeed, the queen of 

 the fruits. Long may she reign, a welcome sovereign. 



Strawberry Buttons. — A correspondent of the N. Y. Tribune argues that 

 buttons are the result of a lack of protection in winter rather than a lack of 

 fertilization of flowers. This is the case he puts : 



Almost every year we find on some strawberry plants fruit that looks flat and 



