336 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



and 56. With two exceptions you will note that they stand well 

 toward the top. You will also note that the inbred ears stand well 

 toward the bottom. 



The average yield of the 9 pedigreed crosses is 78.01 bushels 

 per acre. Of the 18 field selections, 71.01 bushels per acre — a gain 

 of 7 bushels per acre for breeding. 



It may not be amiss to say that the field selections were much 

 superior to the pedigreed ears in so far as looks were concerned. 

 The former were the pick of many bushels, while the latter of 

 very few. 



I must call your attention to ear No. 44, a new plant selection 

 from the field, which has proved itself worthy to go into the breed- 

 ing plot of next year. I have assumed in the past that such ears 

 ought to be found each year. I believe they will continue to be 

 found. It seems to me that the breeder who assumes that he gets 

 hold of all the good ears he has need for in his first selection of 

 25 to 100 ears, thereafter depending upon "fluctuating variation," 

 so called, for his improvement, is making a mistake. Nature does 

 not stop working, but is continually offering us her new mutations. 

 It would seem to be the part of wisdom to take advantage of them. 



Prof. Dean of Ontario said, in an address before the National 

 Dairy Show at Chicago, recently, "As a matter of fact, what suc- 

 cessful breeders do is to keep a sharp lookout for the novelties 

 which Nature may send them." If this be true, as he says, in 

 dairy breeding, how much more true in plant breeding, where the 

 numbers of individuals worked with are so many times greater. 



If for a single season we fail to find what we are looking for 

 we need not despair. They are in our fields, and sooner or later 

 will get into the ear-row test, and thence into the breeding plot. 



BREEDING PROBLEMS. 



Are we to expect that all crosses of choice pedigreed ears, and 

 all the progeny of a given cross will be equally good? No! Re- 

 ferring to Chart IV, ears 34, 42 and 55 have the same sire and dam, 

 but they are not all superior ears. Nos. 34 and 55 are "worthy 

 sons of worthy sires ;" No. 42 is not, and probably for good reasons, 

 for while the sire and dam are the same, the grandsire and dam, 

 and the great-grandsire and dam are not. 



It looks as though we had about the same problems confront- 

 ing us in corn breeding as in animal breeding, and that, like the 

 latter, we shall find that it is not only a matter of breeding, but 



