256 NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



seeds. These have been propagated a sexually, or by buds, so long that 

 they have lost their habit of seed formation or are only freaks, but they 

 serve to prove the argument that I have long advanced that fruitfulness 

 could be largely increased or decreased by good or bad propagation. No 

 one has ever yet seen a large, luscious strawberry unless the potency of 

 pollen was strong and healthfal as well as the pistil and receiving fluid 

 of stigma. 



LET THE PLANTS BEAR. 



The passion of the plants to breed by seeds (which are only the 

 plant's eggs) is as strong as that of any animal and if not held under 

 restriction by pruning they breed themselves into impotency in an in- 

 credibly short time, and this is especially true of strawberries. It will 

 not do to remove blossoms year after year and never allow plants to 

 fruit, because it is well understood that whether in plant life or animal 

 life a physical power never exercised will soon be lost. They must be 

 allowed to develop berries to strengthen their ability in this direction, 

 but must no more be rllowed to fruit to excess than you would allow a 

 valuable stock animal to breed excessively. I speak now of the plant for 

 purposes of propagation. 



When a plant becomes exhausted it then multiplies its species by pro- 

 ducing runners. Sometimes such plants produce bloom in great profu- 

 sion, but at harvest the berries are deformed, small and have many 

 blanks. We cannot cut an ao.imal in pieces and grow several animals 

 froin him, because he contains only one indivisable life germ, while the 

 tree and plant is not only an individual as a whole, but the protoplasm, 

 as that material in which the principle of life resides, is found in all the 

 nodes and internodes of the branches and often the roots of the tree. 

 And it is for this reason we are able to propagate by runners, cuttings, 

 grafts, etc. 



Plants propagated in this way are children of one parent, and receiv- 

 ing but one impress they bear fruit, as a rule very closely resembling the 

 plant from which they were taken, and yet when placed under changed 

 conditions the greatest variations often take place. Variation is one 

 of the great laws of nature. No two blades of grass or anything else 

 ever grew which were exactly alike. Sometimes these bud variations are 

 so great as to constitute entirely new varieties. In floriculture the 

 number of new varieties produced in this way is very large and cases in 

 fruit go well up into the hundreds and will become more numerous when 

 fruit growers understand and begin to look out for them. 



PROPAGATION FROM CROWDED BEDS. 



We often find a branch of an apple tree bearing fruit differing widely 

 from other branches, and this may be increased by propagating from that 

 branch. So in this way we may greatly improve varieties by continuously 

 propagating from perfect plants and those which vary in the right direc- 

 tion. Every fruit grower should be constantly on the lookout for such 



