210 LUTHER BURBANK 



large. Still the total number was only a frac- 

 tion of what would have been the output of 

 poppy plants of normal fertility. 



All in all, this experiment of hybridizing the 

 oriental and the opium poppies, with the pro- 

 duction of relatively infertile hybrids showing 

 Mendelian heredity as to some traits and a 

 blending of characters as to others, and a fur- 

 ther segregation and recombination of charac- 

 ters in the second generation, constitutes an 

 unusually interesting experiment in heredity. I 

 have made many other experiments in breeding 

 the various poppies, but none perhaps that ex- 

 celled this one in interest and importance. The 

 best of these new hybrids have now been grown 

 both by division and from seed for sixteen 

 years and are unusually vigorous and have 

 flowers of wonderful sizes and various colors, 

 mostly crimson. 



