27 



A careful study of the resulting harvest did not at first suggest any solu- 

 tion to the problem when by mere accident an observation was made which 

 served to place the whole question in an entirely new light. Of all the hun- 

 dreds of cultures under consideration only those few which came from a single 

 head or plant produced a uniform progeny. This observation seemed to 

 indicate without question, that the quickest way, if not the only way, to obtain 

 a uniform sort was to begin with a single plant. It was therefore decided, after 

 the corroborating results of another year's investigations had been obtained, 

 that henceforth all work must be based on this principle, the single plant 

 to be the unit for improvement instead of the 'group.' This method had 

 already been used by Vilmorin of France and is now popularly known through- 

 out Europe as the ' Vilmorin System of Selection,' although at Svalof it is 

 usually referred to as the System of Pedigree or Separate Culture. 



The basic principle of the new system was to separate out the greatest 



Form 

 possible number of distinct botanical forms, to propagate each of these se- , 



parately and, by a process of elimination, finally to isolate the best. This idea on ^ 

 of form-separation ("Formentrennung"*) as a means of discovering superior of correla- 

 individuals as starting points for new races, had been applied by LeCouteur tions. 

 and Patrick Shirriff of England many years before, but at Svalof it was in- 

 troduced on a much greater scale. 



While the system of separate culture was therefore not new, yet the credit 

 of devising a new method of application was claimed by Svalof. This method 

 consisted of basing the selection of mother plants upon assumed 'correla- 

 tions' between botanical characters and industrial qualities. Great weight 

 was attached to such points as the position of the branches in oat panicles, 

 the number of kernels in the spikelets and the density or closeness of the head 

 in wheat and barley (34 p. 50). The question of correlations will be dealt 

 with more in detail later (See page 31). 



In order to facilitate the handling of large numbers of distinct botanical 

 forms a system of classification was devised by which it was sought to ar- Classification 

 range the different types into sharply defined groups. Thus in wheats 7 of Forms into 

 types were distinguished chiefly on the basis of the shape and density of the Grou P s - 

 head; in oats 5 main types were described while in barley 12 types were 

 named. 



A system of numbering the different sorts was also devised which would Si stem , 

 indicate at once the general type to which each belonged. Thus an oat sort num bering 

 belonging to type 3 was given a number preceded by the figure (3). This the different 

 in turn was preceded by (o) to distinguish it from ordinary numbers, sorts. 

 Victory oats for example, is registered under the number 0355, which indi- 

 cates that this sort belongs to type 3. The figures (55) indicate the number 

 of the individual sort itself. This system was of great assistance so long as 

 selection was confined to botanically different forms but when the practice 

 later became to select large numbers of individuals from certain old races 

 without special regard to botanical or morphological characters it naturally 

 played a less important part. 



*Fruwirth. 



