PLANT BKEEDING 



175 



166. Selection of desired characters. Of course the practical 

 plant breeder would concern himself only with the characters 



of timothy which affect its value 

 for haymaking or for a pasture 

 grass. For haymaking he would 

 try to get a combination of 

 characters which would give 

 abundant leaves, stems branch- 

 ing freely from the base, and 

 heads and seeds large enough 

 to insure good reproduction. 

 A single plant of a good type 

 will yield about five times as 

 much hay as one of a poor 

 type like that which is shown in 

 the upper part of figure 153. 



FIG. 153. Variation in timothy 



The two lower plants are of the same age and from the same seed, growing side 

 by side in the field. The one at the left is a dwarf; the one at the right a large 

 and desirable type. The one in the upper part of the figure is a dwarf plant with 

 very large heads an undesirable type, from its scanty leafage and few stems. 

 Photograph by New York Agricultural Experiment Station 



