Blakeslee: Fancy Points vs. Utility 



181 



industry, and even the agriculturist 

 must often cater to the demand for 

 fancy points in his market. The pubHc 

 prefers a red-skinned apple to a yellow 

 one. In some markets, asparagus must 

 be bleached, in others green to obtain 

 a ready sale. In New York City on the 

 first of last February the market 

 quotations listed white shelled eggs at 

 37 cents a dozen and brown eggs at two 

 cents cheaper, while in Boston, brown 

 eggs are preferred. Other instances 

 could be given to show that the public 

 needs educating to the real value of 

 products as well as the showman to the 

 real value of his producers. 



An attempt has been made to show 

 that fancy points have an undue 



prominence over utility points in the 

 show room and thereby tend to pervert 

 the aim of the breeder. An example is 

 given from poultry of the demand for 

 yellow beaks and legs in show birds of 

 certain breeds, despite the fact that the 

 presence of this yellow is indicative 

 of poor laying ability. It is suggested 

 that the show room standards be 

 changed and greater account be taken 

 of yield; that judges disqualify for 

 characters indicating low yield; that 

 efforts be made to discover to what 

 extent visible characters are correlated 

 with high production and that points 

 be allowed commensurate with the 

 degree of this correlation. 



NEW PUBLICATIONS 



PLANT BREEDING, by L. H. Bailey. New edition revised by Arthur W. Gilbert, Ph. D., 

 professor of plant-breeding in the New York State College of Agriculture at Cornell University. 

 Pp. xviii+474; 113 illus. The Rural Science Series (edited by L. H. Bailey); The Macmillan 

 Company, New York, ,1915. Price $2.00 net. 



PROFESSOR Bailey's pioneer text 

 book on plant breeding, issued 

 20 years ago, has gone through 

 ntunerous editions, and has now 

 appeared as an almost entirely new 

 book, summing up the present state 

 of knowledge on the subject and 

 becoming what is probably the best 

 and most complete practical handbook 

 of plant breeding in the English lan- 

 guage. Intended for college students, 

 the book deals with the statistical side 

 of heredity more than the average 



horticulturist will enjoy; but in this 

 feature will perhaps lie its greatest 

 value to the man or woman who intends 

 to make plant breeding a profession. 

 An interesting chapter is given to the 

 origin of well-known varieties of culti- 

 vated plants, and another to a survey 

 of organized work in plant genetics — 

 "The Forward Movement in Plant 

 Breeding." A compact glossary and 

 extended bibliography are added, to- 

 gether with an appendix outlining 

 laboratory exercises for students. 



To Grow Pedigreed Seeds 



Beliving that the present war furnishes an excellent opportunity for America 

 to capture some of the seed-producing business hitherto held by Europe, farmers 

 of Northern Idaho have formed the Kootenai Valley Seed Growers Association, 

 of which C. W. H. Heideman, Bonner's Ferry, Idaho, is secretary. The organiza- 

 tion is cooperative in nature and advertises that its seeds "were grown by scientific 

 methods of selection and are as near pedigree seeds as it is possible for human to 

 grow them." As a guide to scientific procedure, the secretary has been commis- 

 sioned to compile a popular handbook on the application of modern plant-breeding 

 methods to commercial seed growing. 



