Methods in Breeding Hardy Fruits. 275 



for the first time. Some of them are hybrids of the South Dakota sand:" 

 cherry with the peach, nectarine, Japanese plums, a Chinese apricot, 

 and a purple-leaved plum from Persia. Progress is also being made 

 In originating hardy cherries, strawberries, and raspberries. By far 

 the most extended experiment on record in the making of graft-hybrids 

 of the apple has been undertaken and we await the fruiting of the 

 resulting plants with interest. In ornamentals the main work done 

 has been crossing the wild Dakota and Siberian roses with choice 

 double roses. If sufficient greenhouse facilities are afforded, the prop- 

 agation of such new seedlings as give promise of permanent value- 

 will be pushed, so that they may be distributed for trial elsewhere as 

 rapidly as possible. The advancing northward at least 500 miles of 

 the successful cultivation of the cherry, peach and apricot and that 

 of winter apples, we trust will be some of the results of erecting: 

 this novel workshop for the invention of new hardy fruits. 



Considerable success has been secured in hastening the fruiting 

 of cross-bred seedlings. For instance, strawberries originated one 

 winter by crossing the wild with the tame have been raised up te 

 fruiting size the same year outdoors and fruited in pots under glass the 

 following winter. This saves much time in selecting varieties for propa- 

 gation and also hastens the work of propagation by our being able to 

 pot many layers before transplanting to the field. j 



In handling a quarter of a million fruit seedlings I find many 

 interesting side lines of investigation presenting themselves, but just 

 now the main effort must be to originate a few varieties of the various 

 orchard and small fruits worthy of a permanent place on the present 

 limited fruit list. Some of the seedling variations which present thenx- 

 selves make me feel confident that Dr. Hugo De Vries in his theory oC 

 mutuation hit the nail on the head. It is certainly a very helpful' 

 thought that new forms worthy of specific rank can originate as sports,. 

 that evolution is by saltation, that is, by leaps or steps, instead of" 

 being a long and very gradual upward slope. Memebers of the legis- 

 lature who have the dispensing of funds will certainly find more com- 

 fort in the theory of De Vries than in that of Darwin. My experience- 

 at first hand with many thousand seedlings of native and cultivated^ 

 fruits and plants, certainly compels me to believe that the evolution 

 of new species as the result of man's effort intelligently directed ia 

 more like the labor of an inventor of machinery in his workshop than 

 that of an observer of an ever changing panorama. In brief, plant- 

 breeding is the inventing or new plants, using material as furnished 

 by nature; and the time necessary for the work with modern scientific 



