DISCOVERY OF MARQUIS WHEAT 185 



lude, Euby does not shatter so readily, has longer straw, 

 has a larger yield, is beardless instead of being bearded, 

 but is a few days later in ripening its grains. It is now 

 being rapidly tested in the West. It may supplant Pre- 

 lude to a greater or lesser degree but is not expected to 

 replace Marquis in those more southerly districts where 

 the latter does so well. 



Marquis ripens about one week earlier than Eed Fife, 

 Rubv about two weeks and a half earlier, and Prelude 

 more than three weeks earlier.^^ The length of straw and 

 the yield vary inversely as the earliness. Thus Prelude, 

 the earliest of the three wheats, has the shortest straw and 

 the least vield : Eubv, which is intermediate in earliness, 

 has straw of intermediate length and has an intermediate 

 yield; while Marquis, the least early of the three wheats, 

 has the longest straw and the best yield. 



It is evidently not an easy matter to combine extreme 

 earliness with a very high yield; and this is not surpris- 

 ing, for the earlier a wheat is, the shorter is its growing 

 period, and the less is the time at its disposal for manu- 

 facturing the starch and proteins which are required to 

 fill the grains. Other things being equal, extreme earli- 

 ness and high yield are mutually antagonistic qualities. 

 It is unthinkable that wheat should ever be introduced 

 which would ripen in seventy days and yield from thirty 

 to fifty bushels per acre, nor does it seem at all likely 

 that cereal breeders wiU ever succeed in producing a wheat 

 which combines the extreme earliness of Prelude with the 

 very high productivity of Marquis. Beyond a certain 

 point increased earliness can only be selected at the ex- 

 pense of high yield, and vice versa. 



51 At the Indian Head Experimental Farm, in 1918, Ruby was sev- 

 eral days earlier in ripening than Mr. Seager Wheeler's Red Bobs. 

 Observations of the Superintendent of the Farm and of the author. 



