REPRODUCTIVE ORGANS OF THE STRAWBERRY 
In the above photograph a portion of a perfect flower has been cut out and highly magnified. 
The pistils terminate in rough, sticky surfaces, to which a falling grain of pollen readily 
adheres. 
It soon begins to germinate, and sends a long tube down the pistil, until it 
reaches the base where the ovule is located. The nucleus of the pollen grain slips down 
the pollen-tube and unites with the ovule, thus completing the fecundation of this par- 
ticular seed. Every pistil must receive a grain of pollen, if all the seeds are to grow. 
Photograph by John Howard Paine. 
under the cloth frame. Pollen falls on 
the pistils and fertilization takes place. 
Seed from the resulting berries is 
collected, cleaned, and kept one year. 
Mr. Hubach says that the weaker seed is 
killed by being stored while the good 
seed starts better. It is then soaked in 
water for three days and planted about 
the middle of May in sterilized soil 
composed of half sand and half well- 
rotted stable manure. The seed usually 
germinates readily and the young plants 
appear in three or four days. They 
are grown in a lath house under two- 
thirds shade and are watered carefully 
with a fine spray. When the plants 
(Fig. 3.) 
have three or four leaves, the ones with 
undesirable characteristics are discarded. 
Correlation of characters makes it pos- 
sible to discard most of the undesirable 
ones at this time. 
The year after that in which the seed 
was planted, fruit will be borne. From 
among the seedlings thus produced, 
Mr. Hubach selects the one nearest to 
his ideal. If it lacks some desirable 
character he crosses it on the one of his 
pistillate varieties which he has found 
will supply the missing character. From 
the resulting seedlings he expects to 
secure his ideal. 
JOD 
