1126 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



himself prefers to make it as high up as possible. The safest time to pollinate is near 

 the beginning of the receptive condition of the pistils or perhaps twenty-four hours 

 before. A receptive stigma usually glistens when it catches the sunlight and in most 

 fruits it is beginning to be slightly brownish. Brush pollinating is often most prac- 

 ticable when many blossoms must be pollinated in a short time. For our common 

 trees, however, some workers use the thumb or forefinger. As to the percentage of 

 successes, seven poilinators of experience placed their averages variously at from 50 

 per cent down. 



Some phases of pollination were presented by N. O. Booth. The period during 

 which fresh pollen is available for study may be lengthened by forcing twigs in the 

 laboratory. If pollen is taken from the orchard at the normal blooming season it is 

 advisable to take twigs with still unopened buds and let them open indoors. This 

 assures freedom from foreign pollen. Very few apple varieties have the pollen all 

 good and none so far all bad, most varieties showing different proportions of mixed 

 forms. Pollen from the same tree may differ with the condition of the tree. Tomp- 

 kins King and Esopus Spitzenburg among others have notably weak pollen and are 

 successfully raised only in neighborhoods where conditions are favorable for pollen 

 production. Varieties with particularly strong pollen, as Jonathan and Ralls, are 

 of wide adaptation and are often liable to overbear, the fruits being consequently 

 undersize. 



F. VY. Card presented a symposium of experience as to the advantage of double- 

 working apples on vigorous stocks. The value of top-working to increase hardiness 

 < it stock in a trying climate is unquestioned. It markedly reduces injury from certain 

 diseases. Northern Spy, especially, promises to reduce injury from the woolly aphis 

 in the South. Weak-growing varieties are benefited by the practice. Early bear- 

 ing can be promoted by top-working on a weak stock, although at the expense of 

 productiveness and doubtless of longevity. But for ordinary varieties in favorable 

 regions the advantages of top-working are outweighed by the disadvantages. 



Earle J. Owen discussed The Importance of Selection in Plant Breeding, citing 

 several striking examples of its application. 



L. C. Corbett raised the query, What is to be the Future Application of the Term 

 Horticulture? To the already recognized subdivisions of horticultural interests in 

 America, namely, olericulture, pomology, floriculture, and landscape gardening, the 

 author would add plant breeding and plant propagation. Under the latter head is 

 comprised nursery work and the increasing of annual plants from seed or from her- 

 baceous cuttings. 



H. J. Eustace gave an account of investigations on apple decays in commercial cold 

 storage. Several varieties of apples were inoculated with black rot, brown rot, bit- 

 ter rot, soft rot or blue rot, and a species of Alternana, and at once put in cold storage 

 at a constant temperature of 30 to 32° F. At the end of two months none of these 

 diseases had developed except the soft or blue rot. Later, when the inoculated fruit 

 was taken out of storage, the other diseases also developed, showing that the low 

 temperature of the cold storage simply retarded the fungi in their development but 

 did not destroy them. Jn another experiment, where the temperature ranged from 

 37 to 56°, decays developed slowly, except the soft rot; but when the temperature 

 ranged from 54 to 65.5° all decays developed and in most cases very rapidly. 

 Peaches similarly inoculated and field in cold storage two weeks developed decays 

 in about one-half of the specimens. 



Prof. W. R. Lazenby read a paper on the use of colored cloth in shading plants. 

 Cabbage, tomato, lettuce, and geranium plants, as well as seeds of corn, peas, beans, 

 and radishes were grown under ordinary white cheese cloth shade, as well as cheese 

 cloth colored black, red. blue, and yellow. Corn and bean seeds came up most 

 readily under the black cloth, but the plants under both black and red cloth soon 



