SEEDS AND SEED GROWING 93 



140. Breeding and selection. Rawson says ("Success 

 in Market Gardening," p. 57) : "Perhaps we might truth- 

 fully say that the most important of all points in garden- 

 ing is the right selection of seed ; for without good seed 

 the care and expense devoted to selecting and fitting the 

 land, or procuring and using implements, fertilizers, etc., 

 are all bestowed in vain." 



It is easily possible, however, to select seeds for years 

 without making any advancement. This actually hap- 

 pened in the experience of Livingstone. For 15 years 

 he labored in vain, eager to improve all varieties, but no 

 progress was made, because wrong methods were em- 

 ployed; the largest and finest specimens of tomatoes 

 were selected, year after year, with little or no regard 

 for the plant. Then the plant instead of the individual 

 tomato was made the unit, and Livingstone soon became 

 a prolific producer of important varieties; no other man 

 has accomplished so much for the improvement of the tomato. 



The securing of good seed is not so much a question 

 of selection as it is of careful and intelligent breeding. 

 Starting with the plant as the unit, the grower must 

 decide what he wants and what his market demands ; 

 for he himself might be very well satisfied, and his 

 market very much dissatisfied. Suppose he is growing 

 tomatoes and the plants are yielding well, but the fruits 

 are generally rough and ill-formed, and yet, in looking 

 over the field a few plants may be found which are 

 highly prolific, and also produce better-shaped fruit than 

 the hundreds or thousands of other plants growing under 

 the same conditions. Seed should be saved from each of 

 these plants, kept separately in numbered packets, and 

 the next year the plants from each lot of seed set in 

 different rows or plats. One of the selected plants may 

 possess greater power to perpetuate its good qualities 

 than any other, but this important discovery cannot 

 be made if the seed from these plants be mixed. 



