IMPROVEMENT OF FRUIT BY CROSS-BREEDING. 



lake towns, four thousand fruit trees during the transplanting season; and yet we have 

 no fear that as fine fruits as we can easily raise in Wayne county, will ever need to beg 

 for a market. We will cordially rejoice with those who can or will excel us, and engage 

 never to be jealous over a rival. R. G. Pardee. 



Palmyra^ Feb.. 1S51. 



ON THE IMPROVEMENT OF FRUIT BY CROSS-BREEDINa. 



BY JOHN TOWNLEY, PORT HOPE, WISCONSIN. 



In the July number of the Cultivator, is the substance of a paper by the President of 

 the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, on raising new pears. He urges the importance 

 of raising seeds for new varieties by crossing, regularly and systematically conducted, and 

 proposes that two good varieties of summer, autumn and winter pears, should be grown in 

 three different locations, a quarter of a mile a part, and out of the influence of other pear 

 trees. The Seckel and Louise Bonne de Jersey, for instance, are to be grown by themselves, 

 and the seeds, when taken from the ripe fruit, are to be labelled, Louise Bonne fertilised 

 by the Seckel, and the Seckel fertilised hy Louise Bonne. 



It is a matter of some importance to raise new varieties of fruit, which, by the same 

 expenditure of land and labor, will yield more certain and more abundant crops, and of 

 greater excellence than many varieties we now possess. It is desirable, therefore, that all 

 who may wish to devote a portion of their time to this good work, should know by wliat 

 means they can most certainly attain the object they have in view. I entirely coincide in 

 the opinion that cross-breeding is that means; but I cannot so readily subscribe to the au- 

 thor's method of conducting the experiment — and I venture to hope that I shall be able to 

 prove that my objections are well founded. 



It is usual with the best cultivators especially to fertilise a few flowers, not to trust to 

 crosses which may incidentally take place between varieties growing contiguous to each 

 other, which appears to be the plan recommended. A man may botanise a summer through 

 without meeting with a single plant which he has reason to believe to be the offspring of 

 two parents; 3'et there is little doubt that many of our wild flowers can be made to inter- 

 marry Avith each other. In gardens, a closer relationship exists between many plants, 

 than between the wild flowers of the fields. We have in the garden, many varieties of one 

 species; in the woods each plant is a distinct species — and experience has proved that it is 

 much easier to breed between varieties than between species; hence, in gardens, natural 

 crosses not unfrequently occur. But it will be found a true saying in this, as of more 

 important matters, that "itis well not to trust to others what we can do ourselves" — and of 

 all helps, the wind and insects will be found most capricious, and little to be relied on. Pollen 

 is known to be conve3'cd by the wind, for miles, and bees in their wanderings, do not limit 

 their flights to the extent of a quarter of a mile ; there is, therefore, almost as great a probabili- 

 ty that the seeds of the two trees growing side by side, would be fertilised by the pollen of 

 others growing at a distance, as that one tree should fertilise the flowers of the other. 

 Each blossom of the pear, moreover, is provided Avith its own stamens, affording pollen at 

 the exact time when the embrj-o seeds are in a condition to be fertilised. I am quite at a 

 loss to understand by what freak the pollen of the flowers of each tree is to fertilise the 

 seeds of its neighbor, rather than its own. That some may be cross fertilised, is proba- 

 t they will be exceptions — and in our endeavors to improve the pear, whose seed- 

 equire so long a period to arrive at maturity, in a matter so important as cross- 



