86 



HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY OF NEW YORK. 



from India, a very vigorous and disease-resisting cane. Dr. Kobus has pub- 

 lished four reports on the results of the seedlings obtained from the Cheribon- 

 Chunnee cross. In raising the seeds the parent plants were planted alternately 

 in rows : 



The reports are entitled De zaadplantcn der kruisiiig van Clicribonrict 

 met de Englcsch-Indische varietcit Chunnee, and W'Cre published as the Pro- 

 ceedings of the East Java Station Nos. 1, 12, 21, 33, of the Third .Series. 



The seedlings raised are carefully grown for four years at the station 

 and compared with the Cheribon. The best are then distributed to the estates. 

 The anticipations of Dr. Kobus have been realized, as canes combining both 

 high sugar content and disease-resisting power have been obtained by this 

 cross. The yield of sugar of some from the canes is said to vary from 6 to 8 

 tons per acre. In some cases the fecundating power of the pollen of the 

 Chunnee is so strong that more than 95 per cent, of the hybrids resemble the 

 naale parent.* i 



D. G. Fairchild: Has that investin^ation of Dr. Stubbs taken this direction, as to 

 whether there are occasional joints or buds which produce better yield, so that they can 

 be taken as a unit, as Mr. Tracy mentions in his paper, and each one of those joints can 

 be taken as a basis of a new variety? 



D. Morris: I am afraid that Dr. Stubbs has not been able to go so far as that. 

 What he has done so far, I think, he has followed the canes up to two or three years 

 only. He has not been able to take them on a sufficiently large scale for that purpose. 



S. A. Beach: Mr. President, I was somewhat interested in the account Mr. Morris 

 has given of the methods of cross-pollination with the sugar cane, and it has reminded 

 me of some results that were secured in my laboratory by Mr. Gould, which are pre- 

 sented in Paper No. 20, in which he found that it is possible to discover by microscopic 

 examination of the pollen whether or not the pollen is fertile, whether or not the pollen 

 is potent. That may be a point of some interest in selecting pollen-bearing canes, espe- 

 cially along the line that Mr. Fairchild mentioned j'esterday, where they may choose to 

 select them, and send them from one place to another. Possibly a similar condition may 

 be found in the pollen of the cane. If so, it would be a point of practical value to de- 

 termine by microscopic examination whether or not that variety would furnish pollen 

 that is potent. 



The Chair: Dr. Morris has certainly given us an exceedingly interesting paper. The 

 subject is of very great importance to the world, though not of importance to the cultural 

 operations of the Northern Hemisphere. I am quite sure that we most ot us had the 

 idea that sugar cane for some reason does not now produce seeds. But Mr. Morris 

 has clearly shown us that, while it produces a very small quantity, it does produce seeds 

 which are capable of germination and from which results may be expected. 



D. G. Fairchild: I would like to ask Dr. Morris how large the plantations are at 

 present in which these sugar canes of high sugar content are grown. I have met a num- 

 ber of sugar planters in different parts of the world who have heard about these sugar 

 canes in the West Indies and Java, and their objection seemed to be that the plants 



* Agricultural News, I., p. 146. 



