THE PLANT 



6 7 



this plan continuously you will have every year seed from 

 several generations of choice plants, and will each year 

 improve your seed. 



It is of course advisable to move your seed plat B every year 

 or two. Select for the new plat land that has recently been 

 planted in legumes. Always give this plat unwearying care. 



In this selection of plants from which to get seed, you 

 must know what kind of plants are really the best seed plants. 



FIG. 52 



First, you must not regard single heads or grains, but must 

 select seed from the 'most perfect plant, looking at the plant 

 as a whole and not at any single part of it. A first con- 

 sideration is yield. Select the plants that yield best and 

 are at the same time resistant to drouth, resistant to rust 

 and to winter, early to ripen, plump of grain, and non- 

 shattering. What a fine thing it would be to find even 

 one plant free from rust in the midst of a rusted field! 

 It would mean a rust-resistant plant. Its offspring would 



