LUTHER BURBANK 



necessary to review briefly the preliminary studies 

 through which he familiarized himself with the 

 hereditary characteristics of the wheat plant. 



Professor Biffen had given attention to the 

 development of the wheat through the ordinary 

 methods of selection as early as 1900, and before 

 anything had been heard of the researches of Men- 

 del, which, as we have elsewhere pointed out, were 

 quite unknown to anyone after the death of Men- 

 del himself in 1884 until about the beginning of 

 our new century. But he had not proceeded far 

 before three observers, De Vries, Correns, and 

 Tschermak, independently discovered and made 

 known the forgotten work of Mendel, and, as Pro- 

 fessor Biffen himself says, "changed the whole 

 aspect of his problem." 



It was at once obvious to Professor Biffen that 

 wheat offers opportunity for hybridizing experi- 

 ments closely comparable to those that Mendel 

 had performed with the pea. 



Both of these plants are normally self -fertilized, 

 their stamens and pistils being enclosed in recep- 

 tacles that are never opened and made accessible 

 to insects or subject to wind poUenation. 



This makes the hand poUenization of the plants 

 a rather tedious and delicate task. 



But once this is effected, the further experi- 

 ments are greatly facilitated by the fact that there 



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