NEW HORTICULTURAL CROPS FOR FOOD SUPPLY 63 



zation. Hybrid walnuts, chestnuts, hickories, and oaks, promise 

 a wonderful improvement in nuts. 



Truth is we do not know how much nor what material we have 

 to work with in many of the groups of plants I have named, lending 

 color to the sa^^ng that the plants with which man has most to do 

 and which render him greatest service are those which botanists 

 know least. This brings me to the last division of my subject. 



Nothing is more certain than that we are at the beginning of a 

 most fertile period in the introduction of new and the improvement 

 of old food-plants. Yet agricultural institutions are most illy 

 prepared to take part in the movement. " Art is long and time is 

 fleeting," can be said of no human effort more truly than of the 

 improvement of plants, and haste should be made for better prepara- 

 tion. Looking over the material that is usable in agricultural 

 institutions, it seems that we are sadly lacking in the wherewithal 

 upon which to begin. It is indispensable for effective work that 

 we have an abundance of material and that we know well the 

 plants with which we are to work. 



How may the material be had? We are fortunate in the United 

 States in having the Office of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction 

 of the United States Department of Agriculture for the importa- 

 tion of foreign plants. This office has eflFective machinery for the 

 work. It maintains agricultural explorers in foreign countries. 

 It is in direct contact with the agricultural institutions of other 

 countries as well as with plant-collectors, explorers, consuls, 

 officers of other countries, and missionaries. Through these 

 agents it can reach the uttermost parts of the world. Morevoer, 

 it has trained men to identify, to inventory, to propagate and to 

 distribute foreign plants. This office can better meet quarantine 

 regulations than can private experimenters or state institutions. 

 All interested in foreign plants ought to work in cooperation with 

 the Office of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction of the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture. 



To be used advantageously material must be near at hand. 

 This means that there must be botanic gardens. There should be 

 in every distinct agricultural region of the country a garden where 

 may be found the food plants of the world suitable for the region. 

 It is strange that in the lavish expenditure of state and federal 



