PROPAGATING NEW VARIETIES OF TREE FRUITS. 191 



PROPAGATING NEW VARIETIES OF TREE FRUITS 

 FROM SEED. 



C. G. PATTEN, CHARLES CITY, lA. 



The secretary doubtless intended to have me tell you how to 

 produce improved fruits from seed, and in so doing he assigned me 

 a difficult task. But difficult as it is I shall undertake it cheerfully 

 and hopefully, realizing that in the forward march in horticulture 

 there is no place for pessimism. We catch no inspiration from hrilt- 

 ting doubt or from the deep shadows and mists of narrow valleys, 

 but from the higher levels of mountain side and mountain top, where 

 the vision scans the widening landscape of hills and valleys and 

 sparkling rivers and sunlit heights. 



We discard the ancient teachings that we must plant a thousand 

 f.eeds to get one good fruit, or the later fact as given by Dr. Dennis, 

 of Iowa, that it required the growing of a thousand plum seedlings at 

 "Sleepy Eye" to awaken one Surprise. If reversion to lower types 

 is such a potent factor in preventing us from producing improved 

 varieties as some believe, then indeed is our Jordan "a hard road to 

 travel." 



At the Iowa state fair I once saw the grand cow Mercedes,, that 

 was milked three times a day and gave in twenty-four hours over 

 eighty pounds of milk. I have seen herds of these cattle that were 

 really very remarkable cows. 



A Jersey cow, Mary Ann, of St. Lambert, made 956 pounds of 

 butter in one year, and the most magnificent large dairy that I ever 

 saw was of this breed of cattle at Spring Hill, Tennessee. Yet 

 from Minneapolis to Des Moines I have seen all along the line great 

 numbers of very inferior Holstein cattle, and I have also seen very 

 large numbers of scrub Jerseys. What developed such results in 

 these breeds? Surely they are good dairy cattle. Was it not want 

 of forethought, want of selection, neglecting to weed out the in- 

 ferior animals? Breeding from animals that reverted so far back 

 to the ancestral type that they were at least 75 per cent scrubs? 

 Mr. Gideon realized this fact in his endeavor to improve the apple. 

 He knew that the air in his orchard was full of the pollen of the little 

 acrid, austere Siberian, mean in almost every quality but hardiness. 

 Hence his desire to establish an experiment station in southwestern 

 Iowa, where he believed the conditions were more favorable for his 

 work ; and this is the reason why no better advance has been made 

 with our larger fruits. We have put too little science and common 

 sense into the formula and have too often forgotten the trite saying 

 that "like begets like," or the likeness of a former ancestor. 



