252 



MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



tail. We are at cross purposes. We do not get at the real physio- 

 logical basis of heredity. As to hardiness, it is the same in any 

 plant now that it was ten thousand years back — I do not know how 

 much further back than that, but that far anyway. I find root-kill- 

 ing of fruit trees and small fruits. Every mile you go northwest you 

 find it. Where we have a drouth in the fall, we have those cases 



Part of three acres of strawberry seedlings at South 

 Dakota Exp. Station. Prof. N. B. Hansen in foreground. 



Mr. Underwood speaks of. It is a lack of hardiness in the plant 

 itself and also a lack of moisture in the fall. Lack of moisture in 

 the fall does not hurt our wild berries. Get that idea out of your 

 head promptly. You get no root-killing of the wild strawberry, 

 and it simply means we have to go back to the wild species ; and 

 instead of being contented with the work done seventy years ago 

 in Massachusetts, we need to do the work ourselves. Hardiness is 

 something inherent in the nature of the plant. It cannot be put 

 there by selection alone, understand that. Why ? Because it is the 

 nature of the thing. The Zulu would freeze to death where the 

 Eskimo would not. What is the difference ? They are both human. 

 What inherent hardiness is, no one knows. The fuchsia will not 



