1922.] PUBLIC DOCUMENT — No. 31. 17a 



Markct-Gardoi Field Station. 



Project 4. "Variety aii<l strain test of tomatoes." 



Professor Tompsox. 



Twenty-five different strains and varieties were under test 

 during the season of 1921, eighteen of these in quadruplicate 

 plots, the balance in simple duplicates. A part of this work 

 was repeated at the home station at Amherst, so as to reduce 

 error due to environment. The most striking indication of the 

 year's work is that differences in yield due to soil conditions 

 are ai)})arently paramount over many of the differences sup- 

 posedly inherent in the seed itself, and due either to breeding 

 or to the climatic environment in which the seed is produced. 



Depart III cut of Poniologi/. 



Project 2. "A study of tree characters of fruit varieties." 



Professor Shaw and Mr. French. 



This project was started in 1912 for the purpose of getting 

 information which wouhl make possible the identification of 

 varieties in the nursery, and which would also serve as a 

 basis for the comparative studies to be made in connection 

 with Project 1, "Study of interrelation of stock and scion in 

 apples." The first report was published in 1914 as Bulletin 

 No. 159, under the title, "The Technical Description of 

 Apples." Photographs of about 100 varieties have been made, 

 and a bulletin discussing the identification of varieties by their 

 leaves is in preparation. So promising has been the progress 

 made that a phase of the work has been taken over by the 

 Massachusetts Fruit Growers' Association, and a plan developed 

 for the certification of certain varieties of apple trees when 

 grown in the nursery row. In the first work done under this 

 plan, 267 out of a total of 2,847 trees were found to be untrue 

 to name, and hence were refused certification. Four hundred 

 and thirty-eight younger trees propagated from trees found 

 untrue to name were also found, making a grand total of 705 

 trees thus prevented from coming into the hands of practical 

 fruit growers under incorrect names. 



