The following paper was read by J. B. Norton : 



IMPROVEMENT OF OATS BY BREEDING 



Jesse B. Norton, Plant Breeding Laboratory, U. S. Department of Agriculture. 



While cereal breeding has received a great impetus in the last few years, 

 due to the results reached by some of our well-known plant breeders, as the 

 Garton Bros., Vilmorin, Hays, Saunders, etc., little has been started in the 

 line of oat improvement. For those who are interested in increasing the nitro- 

 gen content of cereals the oat promises most, for it is richer in protein than 

 wheat or corn, hulled oats averaging about 14 per cent, while other cereals 

 average about 11 per cent. 



While there are a large number of named varieties in cultivation, it is very 

 hard to trace the origin of most of them, many of the names being simply 

 trade names applied to old varieties in order to meet the demand for novelties. 

 Sometimes a good variety has been found growing in fields of other crops, and 

 some one, noticing its good qualities, has introduced it under an appropriate 

 name. The Potato oat is cited as an example, and also the Washington oat, 

 introduced some years ago by Carman. 



Seed growers and seedsmen have done most of the selection work that has 

 been done with oats, and reports on the greater part of this work have never 

 been published. In fact, the literature on the subject is very meagre, and as 

 far as practical permanent work goes, almost no literature can be found. 



The work of the Garton Bros., of England, has been w-ritten up by 

 several scientific writers^ and is well known to most plant' breeders, but this 

 paper would not be complete without a short review of their work on oats. 

 Beginning work in 1880, ihey secured their first successful oat crosses in 1885. 

 About 1887 they commenced to use naked oats as the female parent to avoid 

 the mechanical difficulties in the way of crossing encountered in the hulled 

 varieties. The Gartons have crossed and recrossed the existing types of oats 

 until they have compound crosses containing the blood of a large number of 

 parent varieties. Speir' gives the following parentage for some of the new 

 varieties they have fixed and introduced : 



Tartar King. Black Tartarian, White Tartarian, and White Canadian. 



Pioneer. Black Tartarian, Scottish Potato, Waterloo, and White August. 



Waz'crley. Scottish Potato, Naked Oat of China, White Tartarian, and 

 Flanders Yellow. 



^Carruthers, Wm. Cross-fertilization of Cereals. Journ. Roy. Ag. Soc, p. 684. Vol. 

 IV (1893; . 



^Speir, John. The Produce of Old and New Varieties of Oats. Trans. Highl. Agr. 

 Soc, Ser. s- Vol. XII. 



