Section IV., 1913. [151] Trans. R.S.C. 



Cereal Breeding on the Dominion Experimental Farms During 

 the Past Decade. 



By Chas. E. Saunders, Ph.D., Dominion Cerealist. 

 Presented by Dr. W. Saunders, C.M.G., F.R.S.C. 



Read May 28, 1913. 



When in the year 1903 the experimental work in cereals and some 

 other grains was removed from the Director's immediate care and 

 organized into a separate Division (in charge of the writer of this 

 paper) two principal tasks were immediately undertaken. The first 

 was the careful and systematic study of the large mass of material 

 which had been accumulated during the previous years by importation 

 from foreign countries and by cross-breeding at Ottawa and some of 

 the branch experimental farms. Though a good deal of selection had 

 been done, and many varieties of grain, both new and old, had been 

 rejected, the material had been accumulating at a rapid rate, and re- 

 quired not only thorough study but drastic elimination as well. The 

 second task was to cross the best new and old varieties in as many 

 different and promising pairs as possible. 



Inasmuch as mass selection had almost invariably been employed 

 in the earlier years, the varieties of cereals which came into the writer's 

 hands were chiefly mixtures of related but by no means identical 

 types. Reselection was therefore required in order to produce uni- 

 formity of appearance and — what was even more important — to isolate 

 the very best strains which had arisen from the crosses, or which were 

 to be found in the old varieties of commerce. For several years — but 

 especially in 1903 — the writer devoted much time to choosing the best 

 heads or plants from the various plots. These choices were necessarily 

 only provisional in the first instance; for it is impossible to accurately 

 judge the qualities of a variety or strain by the appearance of a single 

 plant. From each plant a separate strain was propagated. No 

 mixing of strains was allowed, no matter how much alike they appeared. 

 Each was studied separately through a series of years, the inferior 

 ones being rejected from time to time, as their inferiority became 

 evident. 



Of course, as in all such experiments, most of the selections were 

 ultimately rejected; so that after a few years there was very little left 

 of the original material of 1903. Even the named sorts which had 



