SECTION III. POLLINATION 



WHILE you have been learning the names of the differ- 

 ent parts of the flowers, you have perhaps been thinking 

 about the uses of each part. The sepals and petals serve 

 to protect the more important parts inside. For example, 

 the peach sepals and petals while still folded together in 

 the bud keep the pistil from being killed by slight frosts 

 in the early spring ; thus the peach crop is sometimes 

 saved. That the stamens and pistils, however, are more 

 important than the sepals and petals can be proved by care- 

 fully removing all of the petals from a flower of cotton 

 or from a peach blossom. In spite of this injury, a boll 

 or a peach will form if pollen is applied to the stigma. 



Flowers without petals. Since the flower makes seed 

 or fruit by means of the stamens and pistil alone, these 

 two parts are called the necessary or essential parts. 

 The flowers of many plants have no showy sepals and 

 petals. The sepals and the petals are not strictly 

 necessary. When you see the flowers of corn and wheat 

 you may not think of them as flowers, because they have 

 no gay colors. The bees and other insects do not often 

 visit such flowers. 



Function or use of the pistil. The pistil is the part of 

 a flower that develops into the seed-case or fruit. In its 



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