CHAPTER IV 



Smiling anh &?l*rtum of &eeb CJnrn 



/^r ORN breeding has become a specialized industry. 

 1 1 Like stock breeding, the development of corn 

 ^J' varieties will always be more or less in the 

 hands of men who devote their lives to this 

 particular work. All great progress will be made by 

 those especially fitted for work of this kind. As the 

 field is broad and the results extremely profitable, 

 there will be no lack of men trained for this special 

 business. 



The ordinary or general farmer will never breed 

 corn. He must secure seed from the specialist and 

 from this source procure improved strains. Eventu- 

 ally the valuable characteristics will be lost through 

 crossing and indiscriminate selection. The seed will 

 then have to be renewed. In such cases the farmer 

 must secure such strains of corn as are adapted to his 

 conditions of soil and climate. Otherwise the bene- 

 ficial effect of the special breeding might be lost. The 

 live stock breeder usually cannot afford to breed corn 

 and will depend for the most part on the corn breeder 

 for his seed. 



The field for this branch of farming is very great, 

 as is shown by the fact that the corn growers of Illinois 

 alone use over one million bushels of seed every year. 

 The annual consumption of seed corn in the United 

 States is probably in excess of twenty million bushels. 

 Of course, it is not necessary that this seed be se- 

 cured from the breeder fresh every year, but as a 

 rule seed will not remain pure more than four or five 

 years. It then becomes necessary to again secure well- 



