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MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL, SOCIETY. 



line, were obtained from him in the spring of 1896 and 1897, and 

 seeds from the best plants as they fruited in 1898 and 1899. Of 

 the over 14,000 seedlings I have raised from these plants, 8,400 have 

 been reserved for fruiting. The plants show the most wonderful 

 variety in size and flavor, as pointed out by Prof. Charles E. Bessey 

 eleven years ago (American Pomological Society Report, 1899, 

 p. 160) after examining the plants in their native habitat. Some 

 of the plants found in this first plantation, most of which was 

 grubbed up this fall, bear fruit of large size, with but little 

 astringency. But little, in fact, remains to make this a choice table 

 fruit, and it certainly makes a good fruit for culinary' use. 



Showing Variation in Wild Gooseberries (Ribes gracilei. 



In Strawberries the work is being followed along two lines : 

 I. By crossing with cultivated varieties. 2. By pure selection. 

 The native plants, as gathered together from various parts of the 

 Dakotas and Manitoba, several thousand of which have fruited, 

 show marked diversity in size. All are excellent in quality. About 

 twenty plants were selected the past season and layered in pots for 

 pure plantations next year. In crossing to obtain the 5,000 plants 

 enumerated in the list, a new plan was tried. In the fall of 1899 

 about 350 native and cultivated plants were taken up and grown 

 in the greenhouse during the winter. The tame sorts included the 

 everbearing sorts from France as well as leading American sorts. 

 As the blossoms appeared, the bi-sexual ones were emasculated, and 

 pollen from other varieties was applied to these and to the pistillate 

 blossoms. The plan in all cases was to have one of the parents wild 

 and the other cultivated. The seeds were sown at once and ger- 

 minated freely. The pure native seedlings were grown from fruit 



