LUTHER BURBANK 



And it would never have been possible to breed 

 out altogether the undesirable qualities that the 

 original cross had introduced. 



Separating the Traits 



But we have seen in the case of the cherries, 

 as we had previously seen in the case of some 

 other plants, and as we shall have occasion to see 

 in numberless others in future, that it is possible 

 to breed traits into a hybrid strain, and then breed 

 them out again. 



In point of fact, no progress in the production 

 of new varieties could have been made along the 

 lines of my experiments, were it not for this possi- 

 bility. 



My Shasta daisy, for example, is not inter- 

 mediate in size between the species from which 

 it sprang, but larger than any of them. My white 

 blackberry is not intermediate in color between 

 the parental strains, but is of a far purer white 

 than its light colored ancestor. My stoneless plum 

 is more stoneless than the race from which it 

 sprang, although that race has been crossed again 

 and again with strains of plums that invariably 

 produce a stony seed covering. Some of my hybrid 

 w^alnuts are far larger than either parent stock, 

 and some are far smaller than either. 



And so on throughout the list of the hybrid- 

 izing experiments through which the new races of 



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