principles, ratlier than to the attainment of immediate 

 results. With this end in view, the detailed work in the 

 field and in the office has been more elaborate than is nec- 

 essary in plant breeding work intended merely for the 

 improvement of a given variety of cotton, corn, or oats. 



However, encouraging jrogress has been made in the im- 

 provement of the varieties of cotton, corn, and oaits, that 

 were chosen for this investigation. In the Cook cotton pro-^ 

 gress has been made in improving the form and uniformity 

 of the ])lant. in increasing the jiercentage of lint, and in 

 ])r<>ductiveness. Two of the strains thus bred up took the 

 first and second rank in jiroductiveness among the thirty 

 varieties of cotton tested at this Station in 1909. This was 

 done in spite of considerable loss f rom ' anthracnose, to 

 which all strains of this variety are especially susceptible, 

 and toward the reduction of which -by selection -attention: 

 will be directed in the future. 



Gratifying progi'ess has been made in improving the 

 Exjieriment Station yellow variety of corn in the matter of 

 productiveness and number of ears per plant; and signifi- 

 cant'data have been accumulated in a study of the correla- 

 tion of qualities of corn, which latter investigation 

 promises to establish i)rinci}»les that will serve as direct and: 

 practical guides in plant breeding with corn. 



Tn addition to the large number of experiments in im- 

 proving the Cook cotton, the past year has brought to 

 maturity s?veral thousand hybrid cotton plants of the second 

 generation since the cross was made. A careful examina- 

 tion of the qualities of these hybrids is now in progress, 

 •and results ur> to this date are verv encouraging for the 

 .prospect of uniting in one variety many of the various qual- 

 ities required in a cotton suitable for boll weevil conditions* 

 However, this line of work must proceed for several years 

 longer before we can properly expect to demonstrate any 

 marked superiority of any one hybrid or strain. Many 

 hundreds of separate samples of cotton, including the off- 

 S|)ring of single promising plants, have been separately 

 ginned and recorded. 



