114 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan., 



SOME PRINCIPLES AND RESULTS OF PLANT 



BREEDING. 



By Mr. Edward M. East. 



Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen : Plant breeding has 

 recently been called to the attention of the public by many 

 magazine and newspaper articles, generally written from the 

 sensational standpoint and full of distortions of the facts. 

 Probably everyone who has had the subject called to his at- 

 tention for the first time by one of these dissertations, has said : 

 " Why this is not new. It is what I have been doing for years, 

 and what my father and grandfather before me have done. 

 We have selected our seed corn each year from the largest and 

 best ears. We have planted our finest potatoes. We have 

 been plant breeders." 



This is literally true. Plant breeding is simply another in- 

 stance of " Old Friends with New Faces." It probably has 

 been developing ever since the beginning of the cultivation of 

 plants ; but the " New Face " which it now presents to us, the 

 new prospects which are opened up, are due to the new facts 

 which the science of the nineteenth century has brought to 

 light, and which has made rapid advance possible. 



We have record that by the Romans, and probably even 

 by the Greeks and Egyptians, it was known that by selecting 

 the best heads from their grains as seed for future planting, 

 better crops were obtained and deterioration of varieties les- 

 sened. This was the use of method to bring about certain 

 effects, and we can hardly say that it was not real plant breed- 

 ing. However, the fact which I wish to emphasize is that at 

 present we have methods that more surely bring results, 

 methods that are as much in advance of those of even one 

 hundred years ago, as the modern express train is of the old 

 stage coach. Plant breeding is not yet a science. Many more 

 facts must be discovered, and the great mass of data already 

 obtained must be correctly analyzed and set in order before 

 such a claim may be made for it ; but the true scientific begin- 

 ning has been made, and we are making rapid strides toward 

 learning the causes and how to control them, of the phenomena 

 which were observed and wondered at by our ancient fore- 

 runners in the work. 



