INFLUENCE OF THE PARENTS ON COLOUR OF THE HYBRID, 213 
THE INFLUENCE OF THE PARENTS ON THE 
COLOUR OF THE HYBRID. 
By F. J. Coittenpen, F.R.H.S. 
Ir seems to have been an object of most writers on the subject of 
‘ hybridisation since the time of Herbert to formulate a law which should 
be a guide to workers in their efforts to improve plants, and especially 
have they sought to assign to the parents the influence which they each 
respectively exert upon the vigour, the form, and the colouring of the 
offspring. The idea that it is the pollen parent that governs the colour 
of the flowers of the offspring has. been a very prevalent one, and one 
that is very frequently given expression to even yet. 
Dean Herbert wrote, in 1835: “For the purpose of obtaining a large 
or brilliant corolla it will be probably found best in the long run to use 
the pollen of the species which excels in those points, because the corolla 
in truth belongs to the male portion of the flower, the anthers being 
usually borne upon it or in some manner connected with it by a 
membrane; but upon the whole an intermediate appearance may 
generally be expected.’”’* From the wording of this quotation it appears 
to be a rule arrived at by reasoning on a wrong assumption, though one 
perfectly legitimate so far as knowledge in those days went, rather than 
the result of his large experience in the raising of hybrid plants. Other 
writers have expressed similar views, for example: ‘ Experiments . . 
seem to justify this important inference, that as a general rule the 
properties of the male parent will be most conspicuous in the hybrid... 
Exceptions no doubt exist, and hybrids could be found which are either 
half-way between their father and mother or more like the mother than 
the father ; but as the means of judging at present exist, these would 
seem to be the exception and not the rule; therefore the greater influence 
of the male may be taken as a tolerably safe guide in all experiments in 
this interesting art.” f 
Again, Burbidge writes : “The evidence of the prepotence of the male 
parent is well-nigh overwhelming ;”’ = but a little before he says, “I have 
often found the mother more marked than the father in the hybrid 
offspring.” $ 
At the Conference on Hybridisation held in London in 1899, 
Dr. Wittmack said that, in his opinion, “the father [has] the more 
influence] upon the inflorescence, at least upon its colour;’’) and 
Herr Max Leichtlin said, “The male parent gives more or less the 
colouring of the flowers, and if it is richer and freer flowering than the 
female, this property is transferred to the offspring.” {| 
These quotations serve to emphasise the widespread belief in the 
influence the male parent has upon the colour of the hybrid. 
* Herbert, Amaryll. p. 348. t Gard. Chron. 1844, p. 459. 
ft Prop. and Improv. of Cult. Plants, p. 170. $L.c. p.-1 
|| Wittmack, Journ. R.H.S. xxiy. (1900), p. 255. @ Lc. 
