62 THE PEANUT— THE UNPREDICTABLE LEGUME 



AA. Plants erect 



A. hypogaea subsp. asiatica 



(a) var. praecox 



(b) var. tarda 



When a large collection of types of peanuts are brought together, or 

 segregating progenies of varietal crosses are observed, one of their out- 

 standing features is the fact that any ordinarily accepted agronomic va- 

 riety has its own cluster of seed sizes ; seed-coat colors ; shell thicknesses, 

 reticulations, and constrictions ; plant types ; leaf colors, textures, 

 margins ; and many other characters. 



Before Europeans brought the varieties together and began artificial 

 crossing, self-pollination and geographic isolation led, in pre-Columbian 

 times, to the formation of rather distinct varietal groups. The authors 

 mentioned above, with the exception of Hull, have not produced a satis- 

 factory classification nor have they agreed with one another. Everyone 

 who has worked with peanuts can recognize the three varieties known 

 in the United States as Virginia, Spanish, and Valencia. If the agricul- 

 turist can identify these peanut varieties at a glance, there must be some 

 obvious morphological features which distinguish them. 



Richter (59) correctly understood the morphology of the peanut in- 

 florescence and properly described it, but French, English, and American 

 workers have rarely referred to his excellent work. Richter specified in 

 clear morphological terms just where the inflorescences are produced, but 

 he did not provide illustrations. Cultivated peanuts apparently never pro- 

 duce flowers on the main axes of the plant, but on some more or less 

 well-developed axillary reproductive branch. The flowers, contrary to 

 scientific and popular opinion, never arise from the axils of foliage leaves. 

 It is the reproductive branch or inflorescence which thus arises. The in- 

 florescences produce scale leaves similar to cataphylls and it is in the 

 axils of these that the subsequent branches of the inflorescences bearing 

 the flowers are produced. Cataphylls (unless one calls cotyledons cata- 

 phylls) do not occur on the main stem axis. 



Virginia peanuts diflfer from Spanish and A^alencia peanuts in seldom, 

 if ever, producing an inflorescence from the first cataphyll of a lateral 

 branch of any order. This character is common to all forms of Virginia 

 peanuts. They may have large, medium, or small seed, and thick, inter- 

 mediate, or thin shells. They may be prostrate or upright but in the 

 basic features which lead a farmer to say, "Virginia Runner," "Virginia 

 Bunch" or "some kind of a Virginia," they are similar and may be dis- 

 tinguished from other peanuts. On the other hand, Spanish and Valencia 

 peanuts always produce inflorescences in the first cataphylls of secondary 



