AMATEUR ROSE BREEDING 



Necessary Operations Easily Performed, and Results Certain to be Interesting, 



Even if Failures are More Numerous Than Successes — Practical 



Rules and Hints — How Famous Roses Have Been 



Produced. • 



ViviAND-MoREL, Editor of Lyon Horticole, Lyon, France. 



THERE are few more agreeable 

 occupations for an amateur, and 

 few more profitable for a pro- 

 fessional, in horticulture, viticul- 

 ture or agriculture, than that of creating 

 new varieties of flowers, vegetables, 

 cereals and fruits, which shall be more 

 productive and more beautiful than 

 those now found in our gardens, 

 orchards, vineyards and fields. 



This occupation is within reach of all 

 who have a little — a very little — spare 

 time, and who are endowed with 

 continuity of thought. 



For professionals who desire to make 

 a commercial enterprise of plant-breed- 

 ing, there is one primary difficulty: 

 they must know the varieties, the races, 

 the sports already in the trade, of the 

 genera which they undertake to improve. 



If they ignore that detail they risk 

 tr}-ing to break in doors that are already 

 wide open, as the saying goes, and what 

 they produce is likely to be an old 

 story. It is only in the case of really 

 sensational acquisitions that one may 

 dispense with a knowledge of what is 

 already in the trade. It is certain that 

 if a horticulturist secured a blue rose, a 

 blue dahlia, a blue carnation, he would 

 not have to worry about the work of 

 his predecessors or contemporaries. If 

 the color existed in those flowers, it 

 would be known. It has been sought 

 long enough. 



It is desirable, when undertaking to 

 secure new varieties, that one specialize 

 in some particular genus. That is the 

 way followed by a great many of the 

 most successful horticulturists, viticul- 

 turists, and agriculturists. 



One might take up roses, various 

 shrubs, gladioli, petunias, verbenas, 



' Translated from Lyon Horticole. 



carnations, salvias, etc., or peas, beans, 

 beets, carrots and other vegetables. In 

 agriculture the wheats, oats, barley, rye, 

 the clovers and alfalfas could furnish 

 remunerative work. This entimeration 

 will suffice to indicate how vast is the 

 field for exploration. As no one is 

 expected to know everything, the 

 breeder should direct his studies to the 

 side which seems to him the most 

 agreeable, the most profi cable and, at 

 the beginning, the easiest. 



SOME TECHNICAL TERMS. 



In undertaking to breed new varieties 

 of plants, it is useful to become familiar 

 with certain terms employed by pro- 

 fessionals, which are constantly found 

 in works that treat of these questions, 

 or that will constantly be heard in con- 

 versation. Such, for example, are the 

 words genus, species, variety, race, 

 hybrid, cross, atavism, selection, segre- 

 gation and some others. I shall sum- 

 marily indicate what we mean in using 

 these words in horticulture. 



Genus. — This word has a good many 

 different significations in French, but in 

 botany it is applied to a group of species 

 which differ in some of their character- 

 istics, but which can be grouped 

 together, for the purpose of facilitating 

 study, because they possess certain other 

 characteristics in common. Example: 

 the rose is a genus which includes a 

 great many species; the gladioli, pe- 

 tunias, heliotropes, clovers, alfalfas, 

 peaches, plums, etc., are genera. 



But all authors are not in accord on 

 the definition of a genus. Formerly 

 cherries and apricots were in the plum 

 (Prunus) genus, and the apples in the 

 pear (Pyrus) genus. Many similar 



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