i 



m THE WAREHOUSE AT SIBLEY 

 Conditioned Hybrid Seed ia Piled from 

 floor to rooL (■;..;■ > . 



hybrid seed for sale, the greater part of 

 which is sold. Among its high-yielding 

 varieties are Illinois Hybrids 960 and 

 582 which stood first and second in the 

 performance tests at Cambridge, Henry 

 and Dwight among 45 hybrids and 

 open pollinated varieties in 1936. Al- 

 though 1936 was a drought year, 960 

 averaged 59.8 bu. per acre at the three 

 fields, while 582 averaged 58.7 bu. 



Other excellent varieties are Illinois 

 753, 344, 543 a good yielder on lighter 

 soils, and 570 and 172, two good early 

 maturing varieties suitable for northern 

 Illinois. 



In the seed warehouse at Sibley, care- 

 fully guarded against freezing weather, 

 are huge stacks of hybrid corn, dried, 

 shelled, graded, and sacked ready for 

 delivery. On each bag is stamped the 

 Ford County Crop Improvement Associa- 

 tion name, the certification trade mark of 

 the Illinois Crop Improvement Asso- 

 ciation, the name of the variety and the 

 name and location of the farm on 

 which the seed was grown. 



According to Manager Schofield no 

 Other large commercial hybrid seed 

 grower is in a position to tag each 

 bag of seed with the name and loca- 

 tion of the farm where it was grown. 

 Farmers like to get seed from fields 

 in their own communities that they 

 have seen developing during the sum- 

 mer and fall. This fact promises to 

 have a profound influence on the fu- 

 ture of the hybrid business and smart 

 seedsmen are shaping their plans to 

 cater to this desire. 



Although much has been written 

 about hybrid seed corn, only casual 

 inquiry reveals that comparatively few- 



know anything about the long-drawn- 

 out process of producing it. Inspired 

 by the work of Jas. R. Holbert of the 

 U. S. Department of Agriculture at 

 Bloomington, Rust began in 1924 to 

 inbreed the best open pollinated seed 

 corn that had been developed on the 

 Sibley farms. 



The plan followed by Rust is typical 

 of that used by all corn breeders. Back 

 in 1924 he shelled off half the kernels 

 from some 550 selected seed ears and 



Elanted them in ear-to-row plots. The 

 alance of the seed from each ear was 

 carefully marked and saved. The 550 

 ears were selected from 1300 bushels 

 of hand-picked seed ears. 



In July and early August when the 

 tassels and silks began to form. Rust 

 and his helpers went into the corn 

 breeding plots and placed paper bags 

 over tassels and silks on all desirable 

 stalks. The plants for bagging were 

 carefully selected for vigorous growth, 

 straightness, freedom frgm disease, 

 number of ears, and similar qualities. 

 After the pollen was deposited in the 

 bag, it was placed on the silks produced 

 on the same stalk. This process is 

 called inbreeding because the ears are 

 fertilized only by pollen produced on 

 the same stalk. 



Rust said that the first year they 

 husked about 3,000 ears from the breed- 

 ing plots. All were numbered so that 

 they could be identified. The next 

 year half the seed was shelled off each 

 inbred ear again and planted in ear-to- 

 row plots, bagged in midsummer. But 

 the second year there were some as- 

 tonishing results. Some of the corn 

 plants didn't have any ears, others had 

 smutty ears, still others had leaves of 



AU READY FOB DEUVERY 

 A bag of high-Tielding Ford county 

 hybrid. 



IT'S CERTIFIED SEED 

 The Illinois Crop ImprOTement Ass'n. 

 Lobel On Every Bag. 



strange colors. Some had rotten ears. 

 Many stalks went down at husking 

 time or before. 



But not all the stalks were bad; 

 quite a few stood up well, had good 

 ears born at the right heighth for husk- 

 ing, were free from smut and disease, 

 and had good quality kernels. The 

 ears from these stalks were carefully 

 saved and labeled. If the tassels burned 

 during the summer, the stalks were dis- 

 carded. 



"We kept inbreeding this way for 

 five or six years," said Rust. "Then 

 we started crossing. We gave the in- 

 breds numbers and kept a careful rec- 

 ord of their p)edigrecs, characteristics, 

 and growing habits. Each year we had 

 fewer inbreds than the year before. 

 We kept weeding out the inferior 

 stalks and their ears until we had only 

 a few we thought were desirable. 



"We also started to trade our best 

 inbreds for those developed by other 

 corn breeders. We got several good 

 ones from Jimmy Holbert of the U. S. 

 Dept. of Agriculture. He got most 

 of us interested in the work. Our 

 R98 line is the best inbred we devel- 

 oped in Ford county. And it took 

 about 10 years to develop it. We 

 crossed R98 with Hybrid A develop>ed 

 by Holbert which produced an out- 

 standing single cross corn that stood 

 up well and carried long, heavy ears." 



The single crosses are made by plant- 

 ing two inbreds in rows side by side, 

 usually three rows of one (the seed 

 bearer) from which the tassels are re- 

 moved, and one row of the other (the 

 pollinator) in which the tassels are al- 

 lowed to develop and fertilize the silks 



FEBRUARY, 1938- 



13 



