128 ANNUAL REPORT 



are as dessert varieties aay one familiar with them well knows. 

 The reason of their superiority lies in their crisp flesh, which is 

 yet so tender as almost to dissolve in the mouth. The more we 

 get acquainted with the Wealthy the more we value it, I might 

 mention the Pewaukee, but the flesh is coarser and is more for 

 culinary use. For pollenizing in cross breeding these varieties 

 would be preferable as named in their order ; also Rawle's Janet 

 or Westfield Seeknofurther could be used, if none of the others 

 could be had. A few scions of such, grafted on some hardy stan- 

 dard or seedling kinds, would soon give the blossoms to work with. 



For planting trees for cress breeding b}' distribution of pollen 

 by wind and insects, little arrangement is necessary, as it is known 

 that pollen will fly, or be carried a long way and from any blossom 

 that is just on the point of opening. 



If any had already been open on the same tree or others in the 

 same orchard, the pistils are just as likely to be fertilized from a 

 variety forty rods, or even eighty rods off, as one close by or even 

 from the same limb. Most buds throw out, from two to five, or 

 more flowers or spikes, but do not all open at the same time and 

 work naturally like sprouts on a potato, however, it would be well 

 to set, perhaps, rows alternately with such trees as are selected for 

 the mother or for the Iruit, the seeds to be saved for replanting. 

 If the wind should be from one side of the orchard for two or three 

 days, when they^are in bloom the pistils on that side of the rows 

 would mostly be fertilized from the neighboring pollen from that 

 direction, except where insects carry the pollen against the wind. 

 The only practical way to make sure of getting anything like the 

 varieties wanted, would be to try hand work, either on a small 

 scale as described, or by^having the variety selected for the mother, 

 surrounded by the different varieties to be used as walls, and have 

 a canvas tent to cover the first two trees, one year. The next year 

 with the other, etc., so in four years, the same tree can be fertilized 

 four times, and have all the fruit take only after the two varieties 

 inclosed the same year. A tent could be used over the mother tree 

 and cut branches, full of blossoms and inclose in the tent. Of 

 course the tents have to remain until the petals and pistils drj' or 

 wilt. In this way a good share would be just what we would expect. 



Always save the seed of the early variety, if that was the one 

 that was hardiest and the best tree, if you want the new fruit to 

 be of tree, male and a keeper. On the contrary, if you want early, 

 save the seed from the opposite. 



To plant the seeds for new varieties, prepare your soil the same as 



