BREEDING LEGUMINOUS CROPS. 247 



the third season. These centgener plots are grown in a similar man- 

 ner for two years, and the average of the hardiest of each plot is 

 taken as a measure of the hardiness of the respective mother plants. 

 The vigor and yield are also taken as measures of the breeding value 

 of the mother plants. In this way blood lines are here sought which 

 will give more value per acre. Once the product of any mother 

 plant or group of mother plants especially distinguish the parents, 

 they are to be multiplied into varieties for field trial, and if they 

 there prove valuable are to be grown in quantity for general dis- 

 tribution. No doubt hybridization will be used later on, when we 

 have found which foundation varieties are hardiest and best adapted 

 to further experimentation. Mr. Ernest Bessey has been sent 

 abroad by the U. S. Department of Agriculture to search in Tur- 

 kestan and other countries for other hardy forms of alfalfa. At 

 least one of the forms introduced from Turkestan by Prof. Hansen 

 gives promise of being valuable. 



Breeding Field Beans by selection has been successful in so far 

 as nursery centgener tests are concerned. But repeated troubles 

 have been experienced in growing the twenty or more new varieties 

 thus bred in field plots so as to secure records of field yields. No 

 doubt some of these will produce large yields and will probably be 

 of excellent quality. We do not feel warranted in distributing a new 

 variety until we have evidence of superiority from practical field 

 trials which we can give to farmers in the form of tabulated figures 

 representing yields, etc. Very great difficulty is experienced in our 

 dry, hot climate in securing hybrid seeds of field beans. 



Breeding Field Peas. — ^A number of varieties of field peas were 

 collected from seedsmen and growers of this crop. One of the best 

 of these is being selected for yield and type and multiplied for dis- 

 tribution by this experiment station. Many hybrids were made be- 

 tween various varieties of the tall field peas and the heavy yield- 

 ing half dv/arf kinds, and these, together with some of the original 

 or foundation stocks, are being annually selected for yield of grain, 

 form of vine and for general value to the farmer. A number of 

 these varieties are quite promising. We sometimes find it advan- 

 tageous to take seeds of the best of these varieties and plant them 

 one seed in a place, three feet apart, in nursery plots, for a year, 

 and use the best out of the plants thus secured for starting new 

 field plots. The varieties are all tested in the field plots beside the 

 best standard sorts, and any which excel in yield are to be. increased 

 for distribution. In some cases these crosses produce hybrids which 

 promise to be superior in yield of grain. We thus extensively ex- 

 perimented in an effort to secure vines which would stand erect, as 



