254 Principles of Plant Culture. 
likely to accomplish the object sought than between plants 
of the same species. 
If the object is the improvement of present varieties, the 
parents should be chosen with reference to the qualities de- 
sired in the new variety. For example, if it is desired to pro- 
duce a hardy, late-keeping apple, of first quality, any hardy 
variety that keeps well, whatever its quality, may be crossed 
with any other apple of first quality, whether it keeps poorly 
or well, though of two apples of first quality, the better 
keeper should be chosen. 
The plant breeder should first have a very definite idea of 
the qualities he desires to secure in his proposed variety, 
and should then study with much care the qualities of the 
varieties that he proposes to use as parents. The two vari- 
eties that contain the largest number of the desired qualities 
should be crossed. 
440. Cross Fecundation is accomplished through 
cross pollination of the flowers (152); i. e., by placing pollen 
from the anthers of a flower of one of the varieties we desire 
to cross, upon the stigma of the other variety. 
441. Preparation of the Flower. To prevent self 
pollination (152), we are careful, in the case of perfect- 
flowered plants (154), to remove the anthers (144) before the 
pollen is mature. Prior to maturity, the anthers are gener- 
ally pale in color and nearly smooth on the surface, with no 
visible pollen, but a little later, the pollen in most plants is 
visible as a bright-yellow dust adhering to the anthers. 
The anthers may be picked off carefully with the forceps, or 
the filaments that support them may be clipped off with the 
points of the scissors. The anthers must generally be re- 
moved before the petals open. The latter may be gently 
