EXPERIMENT STATION REPORT. 315 



EXPERIMENTS WITH EGGPLANTS. 



A somewhat larger space than usual was given upon the Home 

 Grounds to the experiments with eggplants. This was due to 

 the long list of crosses und,er consideration, and the continuation 

 of the work with the hybrids between the "American" and 

 "Chinese" species that rapidly expands with the years. Only one 

 •commercial variety was added to the list, namely : "Round 

 White," which takes the record number 29 in the many crosses 

 that appear successful with it. 



A study of Blend Fruits in Eggplants. 



The blend plants of the several crosses of eggplants have 

 shown remarkable uniformity; thus, two rows of these were in 

 quite striking contrast with those alongside of the first gener- 

 ation after the blend. This is as one expects after some experi- 

 ence in the breeding of plants, but perhaps nowhere else in the 

 truck garden is this better illustrated. By crossing two dis- 

 similar types, for example the "Black Snake" and "Dwarf 

 Purple," the former a tall standard and the latter a true dwarf, 

 a uniform set of semi-dwarfs is obtained that blooms profusely 

 and bears an abundance of fruit. A fruit of the "Black Snake" 

 is given at i in Plate XL, and is seen to be long, slender and bent 

 (often to more than a right angle). This kind is too small for 

 practical purposes, and the plants are not sufficiently productive 

 to make them worthy of a place in the home garden, except as a 

 curiosity. The "Dwarf Purple" fruit is shown at 3, and is an 

 early sort, but the fruits are too small for market purposes. At 

 2 is shown a sample fruit of the blendl, which is a thorough union 

 of those next to it. Thus, the "Black Snake" is practically spine- 

 less, has a calyx that is green, tinged with purple, and the fruit 

 flesh beneath it is a pale green, the body of the "egg" being pur- 

 plish green, somewhat striped, while the "Dwarf Purple" has 

 a solid dark, almost velvety, purple upon the fruit, calyx and stem, 

 but is nearly white beneath the calyx; this is shown in the plate 

 as one of the calyx lobes was removed just before the picture was 



