Methods and Results of Hybridizing Fruits. 143 



cohabits freely with every fruit that has a pit, and brings forth her 

 horde of paupers, that being nearly all mule, give no return for their 

 existence, and there are some plants that even commit murder, and 

 then devour their victims. One is the Sundew, a Welsh plant, and the 

 other is the Venus Fly-Trap, found on the east coast of North 

 America. 



Except for the purpose of proving an experiment, we never mascu- 

 late and hand pollinate the blossom. It is an outrage upon nature's 

 sensitiveness, and will not provide fruits of as fine quality as by other 

 and better methods. We bring congenial sorts in close communion by 

 bark-grafting them together under stimulating conditions that will 

 cause improved size, productiveness, beauty and quality. 



We cannot mention many of the fruits, we have produced; we were 

 raised where the Talman grew iii perfection, and we have reproduced 

 the Talman that will bear here. We wished for the Seckle pear and we 

 have it on a healthy, hardy tree, free from blight and productive. We 

 have wished for the hardiest types of peaches that would reproduce 

 themselves from seed, so that we could grow them with a kind of in- 

 telligent neglect, by the fence rows. 



We have them in the small white, and large type of red and yellow. 

 We have had them in such abundance that people have come for them 

 with baskets, buggies, carriages, wagons and automobiles. 



By desiring it and breeding for it, out of more than a hundred 

 seedlings we have a hardy apricot, which is large and very beautiful. 

 It is of better quality than the California apricots are when they reach 

 this market. It has survived where all other hardy sorts but the woody 

 Russian have gone down. In 1904 it bore such a marvelously beautiful 

 crop, in 1905 it met with 33 degrees below zero, in the winter, and 12 

 degrees below freezing after blooming, yet last season it bore apricots. 



In the growing of apples we must have all the vigor we can get, 

 which means a hardy root and healthy top, and plenty of pollin to 

 keep the fruit from dropping before maturity. The nursery should 

 grow the sorts most suitable for a given locality in large quantities 

 cheaply. The planter can, without trouble, insert the sorts he prefers. 

 tor ages topworking has been done by tying in a bud or by a split 

 limb, and wedge-graft. That kind of grafting will blight and kill the 

 tree. It is too tedious and expensive to be practiced. Now we have 

 here a new and simpler manner of grafting that is worth millions to 

 horticulture. More than fifty years ago I did topgrafting, and have 

 been familiar with the most advanced methods of propagating ever 

 since, and yet, with all these years, though it is only recently that we 

 have evolved the principle in such simple perfection that it seems in- 

 capable of further improvement. 



