LUTHER BURBANK 



strain; and this was precisely the combination 

 that the plant developer was seeking. Meantime 

 the cross-breeds varied widely, and some of them 

 showed a tendency to vigorous growth and pro- 

 lific bearing. Of course, there were numberless 

 others that showed undesirable combinations, but 

 these were destroyed, and only the plants having 

 the desired qualities in the best possible combina- 

 tion were preserved. By inbreeding these for a 

 few generations, the new qualities were accentu- 

 ated and fixed, and a race of white blackberries 

 which always come true from the seed was estab- 

 lished. 



Let it be particularly noted here that the new 

 berry, as finally developed by selection, combines 

 the traits of two widely different ancestral strains 

 and accentuates them, while eliminating other an- 

 cestral traits. It has the juiciness and sweetness 

 of flavor of the Lawton blackberry ; and it is snow- 

 white, whereas one of its ancestors was black and 

 the other a brownish-white. By selective breed- 

 ing, all trace of pigment has been eliminated from 

 the species. 



It will be obvious that this selecting out of cer- 

 tain qualities from different ancestral strains and 

 reasserting them in a hybrid progeny, with the 

 elimination of other ancestral traits, is a very in- 

 teresting and very remarkable phenomenon. Mr. 

 Burbank early discovered that it is possible thus 

 to segregate the qualities of different parents and 

 recombine them, accentuated, in the hybrids of a 

 second and a few subsequent generations. The 



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