4 2 Breeding Plants ana Animals. 



superior plants are tested; (e) the blood of those prov- 

 ing strongest is saved, and (f) by the aid of records 

 of large yield and good quality, as shown in milling and 

 baking tests, the best blood is accredited, and (g) busi- 

 ness methods are used to induce farmers generally to 

 grow the improved varieties in place of the common 

 kinds. Numerous experiments on the theory of breed- 

 ing are also being carried on, some of which will be 

 mentioned in succeeding articles. 



The experiment station or the large seed firms in 

 starting to breed wheat may properly collect and try 

 many varieties in order to secure the best foundation 

 stocks. The farmer cannot usually afford elaborate 

 field and milling tests to begin with and he should con- 

 fine his attention almost exclusively to the improvement 

 of those few varieties which are successfully grown 

 commercially in the region he wishes to supply with 

 seed wheat. Experiment stations and seed firms also 

 can best secure varieties which they may first improve 

 by taking up simple and quick methods of improving 

 the standard wheats already grown by the farmers. 

 Longer and more thorough processes of selection, also 

 hybridization, followed by selection, should also be 

 begun early, but the results of these will later come into 

 available quantities for distribution. It is worthy of 

 note in this connection that each state has only a very 

 few varieties of wheat grown in commercial quantities 

 and the same is true of oats, barley and rye. This 

 makes it easy to select the few varieties to be used in 

 improvements by breeding. Moreover it is easier 

 beginning to sell an improved variety of a kind of known 

 character and quality than new and untried forms. It 

 is of especial importance to experiment stations that the 

 new varieties they first multiply for distribution be 

 kinds not too strange, differing for instance, only in 

 yield, that they may at once become popular with the 

 farmers, grain merchants and millers. It is an advan- 

 tage to distribute new varieties in the order of their val- 

 ue. Improved varieties make a market for* varieties still 



