THE WINTER RHUBARB 91 



THE ORIGIN OF THE WINTER RHUBARB 



The importance of the new plant, and its wide 

 departure from the traditions of the rhubarb 

 family, might lead one to suppose that the pro- 

 duction of the new variety had been a task of 

 great difficulty. Perhaps from the standpoint of 

 the average plant breeder it could hardly be 

 said that its creation was altogether easy; yet 

 compared with some of my other plant develop- 

 ments the production of this one was at least 

 relatively simple. 



The original stock from which the new variety 

 was developed came to me from the antipodes. 

 It was sent by the firm of D. Hay & Son from 

 Auckland, Xew Zealand. 



The first two or three shipments were lost, as 

 the plants died on the way, but at last I obtained 

 half a dozen very diminutive roots that showed 

 some signs of life. These, as anticipated, 

 produced stalks during the winter instead of 

 following the conventional rhubarb custom 

 of putting forth stalks for only a few weeks 

 in the spring. 



The stalks of this original winter rhubarb, 

 however, were very small about the size of an 

 ordinary lead pencil and certainly not worth 

 cultivating for immediate use, as they would 



