Aluminum Foil Appears to Speed 

 Healing of Wounds on Tree Trunks 



Open wounds on apple, sour cherry, and plum tree trunks resulting 

 from splitting due to winter injury in the winter of 1949-50 have been 

 wrapped with aluminum foil from September 15 to May 5 of each suc- 

 ceeding year. On May 5, 1954, all wounds on all species and varieties were 

 greatly reduced in size or healed completely. Wounds on trunks of un- 

 wrapped trees were nearly their original size and in some instances larger 

 than their original measurement. 



R. Eggert 



Conserving Soil Moisture 



Bark mulch used around young Chestnuts and Blackberries resulted in 

 increased growth of these plants because of increased soil moisture. Or- 

 chard grass cut in early June and left where it fell reduced soil water loss 

 by 10 to 12 percent compared to that lost where grass was not cut. 



Treeberries, Ruhus niorifolnia, which were supplied extra water in the 

 fall, survived the winter of 1953-54 in excellent condition, while plants of 

 this species which did not receive the extra w-ater were winter killed. 



R. Eggert, E. M. Meader, A. F. Yeager 



The Testing and Utilization of New Plants 



A collection of Physalis (ground cherry) varieties from the U.S.D.A. 

 Bureau of Plant Introduction and elsewhere were grown at the Horticul- 

 ture Farm in Durham in 1954 and the following data obtained : Gold Nug- 

 get, also called Sugar Giant, appears similar to P. I. 197691. It was the most 

 productive of those tested. Some of the fruits reached a diameter of 2 inches, 

 but it has inferior quality. The common ground cherry is early and produc- 

 tive with good quality. The Cape Gooseberry from England is identical to 

 P. I. 193577. It has superior quality but is late. The Apple variety from 

 Hawaii is similar to the common variety but late in maturing. Crosses were 

 made between the most desirable types. 



E. M. Meader, A. F. Yeager 



Poultry Husbandry 



Breeding for Whiter Dominant- White Crossbreeds 



Considerable time and money has been spent by poultry breeders in 

 trying to develop a pure white crossbred chick. To help the breeders solve 

 some of their many problems a study was undertaken involving three color 

 factors. 



The extended black, barring, and silver genes were studied in various 

 combinations with heterozygous dominant white. Results indicate sex dif- 

 ferences in the amount of red removed by extended black and silver. In 

 males, extended black generally does not remove as much red as it does in 

 females. However, the females generally show some black and may also 

 have black shanks. Barring has been found to eliminate the black shanks 

 but not all of the black in the body feathers. There appears to be a sex differ- 

 ence in the action of silver, but more data is needed to determine this point. 



The work indicates that silver should probably be present in a domi- 



37 



