Report of the Department of Lands and Forests for fiscal year ending March 31, 1951 Page 112 



White Pine: As in former years efforts were concentrated in this project on the 

 assembling of breeding materials and their testing and evaluation. 



With better facilities and new techniques it was possible to expand greatly the 

 grafting of white pine and improve the quality of the results. Much new and valuable 

 material has been assembled in this way. 



An experiment revealed that it is definitely possible to infect seedlings with 

 blister rust during their first year in the seed beds. 



A small plantation of black currants was established in a low, sheltered cleared 

 spot in partial shade to provide inoculum for infection in the fall, when the occurrence 

 of dry weather destroys most of the currant leaves. 



Outside grafting, developed in 1948 and perfected in 1949, was used for mass 

 propagation of some Mugo pine and Japanese red pine {Pinus densi flora) which were 

 grafted into the plantation of Scotch pine established in the fall of 1947. Scions were 

 also collected from some seedlings of Pinus cembra growing at Angus and successfully 

 grafted into the crown of a mature white pine at Maple. This experiment is to investi- 

 gate Burbank's method of inducing early flowering, and determine whether it may be 

 applied to white pine and related species. 



The artificial hybridization undertaken in 1949 in the plantation at Pointe 

 Platon in Quebec yielded some 3000 presumably hybrid seeds. This is the first time 

 that hybrid white pine seeds have been obtained with both parents resistant to 

 blister rust. 



The breeding work carried out with white pine at the Southern Research 

 Station has now grown to such an extent and produced such results that it begins to 

 receive international recognition. In recent years visitors to the Station from the 

 United States, Sweden, France, Denmark, Norway and Finland have commented very 

 favourably on the achievements. 



Poplar: In work with the aspen group it has been possible to gradually assemble a 

 fairly large collection of silver poplar materials from several parts of its native and 

 cultivated range in Europe. Most of this has been propagated up to a volume which 

 makes it possible to start a fairly comprehensive rooting capacity test from stem 

 cuttings. 



Following the promising results of budding in 1949, new budding material was 

 collected on a fairly large scale at Harvard Forest where a good collection of native 

 aspens from a wide range of localities is available. 



Work with induction of early flowering by using the dwarf variety of 

 trembling aspen occasionally found in southern Ontario is beginning to yield tangible 

 results. • 



Poplar hybridization was again undertaken on a fairly large scale, using mostly 

 pollen of European aspen. 



Arboretum: Efforts are now concentrated on building up an extensive breeding 

 arboretum of white pine and poplars. 



