272 



THE GARDEN AND FIELD. 



January. 1914 



KEEPS OUT 

 ALLTHEMIW 



Maize Breeding and Seed 

 Selection. 



P'rom Dalijcty's Review. 



It is becominjr more and more 

 evident to the i)ractical ajjricultur- 

 ist — as it has ))een for (fenerations 

 back to the pastoralist — that the 

 breedinc^ of the jrro\vin<r commodity 

 with which he has to deal has 

 lavgrelv to do with success or fail- 

 ure in his operations. The agricul- 

 tural laboratories of Cambridsjc 

 and of Rothamsted in England, 

 as well as those of the United 

 States and Canada and other 

 places, are busv with investiga- 

 tions on the subject, more especial- 

 Iv as regards wheat and its maxi- 

 mum production through breeding. 



The ordinarv farmer discerns no 

 differences in the ears of his grain. 

 It is corn, and only corn. And 

 yet, however homogenous a field 

 of corn m it is in reali- 



ty a mixture, which varies year 

 ■ar in the proportions of its 

 different races. This is true of 

 practically all of our cultivated 

 plants. It is enuall - true of .some 

 wild 'sp'ecies, and perhaps cf all. 



If the flower of -^articular 

 form of plant be careful^• protect- 

 ed from chance pollination bv the 

 pollen of some other form, and its 

 seed isolated and "-rown senarate- 

 Iv, it will vield plants practically 

 identical with the parent form. 

 That also is the case with the 

 cereals which supply man with 

 food. In connection with wheat, 

 it was first noted about one hun. 

 dred years ago by a Spanish pro- 

 fessor of botany^ Mariano Lagas- 

 ca. He was then on a visit to 

 a friend, Colonel I/e Couteur, who 

 had a number of farms in .Jersey, 

 some ol which were used to grow 

 wheat. l^agasca pointed out to 

 his hf)st that the fields of wheat 

 were not reallv pure and uniform, 

 as was then the i)revailing belief, 

 and he distinguished no fewer 

 than twentv-three vatieties all 

 growing together. He suggested 

 that some of the varieties might 

 form a larger part of the harvest 

 than others, and that some were 

 possiblv of more economical value 

 than the rest. I.e Conteur took 

 the hint and saved the seeds of a 

 single plant of each supposed vari- 

 ety sei)aratelv. He. thus laid the 

 foundations of the method by 

 which different varieties of wheats 

 have been obtained and main- 

 taine<3. As with wheat, so with 

 other plants. If thev are care- 

 \\\\\\- isolated and their self-pollina- 

 tion is assured, they will breed 

 true to their own varietal forms. 



.\11 the sup])osed cases of the in- 

 stabilit\- of these forms ha\-e been 

 due to pollination of these wheats 

 bv the pollen from, other and ad- 

 jacent forms. 



— Inheritance. — 



Fiftv-five years later, Gregor 

 ^lendel, the Austrian monk, pub- 

 lished the results of his investiga- 

 tions on the inheritance of unit- 

 characters in peas. Up to his 

 time and later it was tacitly ac- 

 cepted as an uncriticised belief that 

 species were aggregates of insepar- 

 able characters — that is, the whole 

 groun of characters which consti- 

 tuted a species were indissolublv 

 bound together and could not be 

 broken up. Kach species had to be 

 rep-arded, if we may take an 

 analoo"y, as a bundle of stacks, 

 each having a different colour, size, 

 thickness, hardness, and so on. 

 And the bundle could not be dis- 

 tinguished. It was not clearly 

 conceived that one or more of these 

 sticks (sDecific characters) could be 

 separated out from the bundle, and 

 made to replace some alternative 

 stick (correSPond'U'' 'cific char- 

 acter") in another bundle (another 

 S'-iecies'). The importance of this 

 discovery was of the srreatest. It 

 enabled man to do' consciously and 

 certainlv what before he only 

 achieved by haphazard and acci- 

 dental efforts. For he could now 

 tack them on to the desirable 

 f'ualvties w"hich the miller and 

 baker require. 



In connection with these develop- 

 ments of hereditv and selection in 

 wheat we mav be f-ertain that in 

 rr>ferpnce to another opreal an 

 abrrdn-ement of a valuable article 

 nnbli.shed in South Africa, where 

 maize is larpnelv o-rown. will be of 

 interest.' It is\bv Mr. H. Oodfrev 

 Mundv. F.L.S., the well-known 

 botanist. 



— Seed Select on. — 



He be^nns bv nnintinfr o^t, with 

 rf'ard to seed S'^lection, that in 

 the case of cereals, the seed of 

 which is frown vear bv ve-ir on 



No •wet weather coat so useful as a Slicker, 

 No Slicker so waterproof, durable or neat in 

 appearance as 



TOWER'S FISH BRAND 

 REFLEX SLICKER 



The on/y slicker with the famoua Reflex Edge 

 (pat <J) that prevents water from running in at 

 the front. Get yours today and be prepared for 

 rain. 



SOLD EVERYWHERE 

 A. J. TOWETR CO. 



8CSTON. U. S. A. 

 Melbourne - Sydney - Bris- 

 bane-Perth- Auckland 



These 

 litTLEX Edges 

 Protect You 



Water 



Cannot 

 Rum In At 

 TiiE Front 



the farm, .selection is seldom at- 

 tended to, and when it is it is 

 looked upon as a matter of minor 

 importance. The creation of hy- 

 brids is always likely to remain 

 the work of the specialist and the 

 laboratory, but improvement by 

 selection lies within the scope of 

 any jrrowier who v/ill devote a little 

 attention to the subject. 



The object of selection is to se- 

 oreg-^te the offsprinj^ of those 

 plants which combine the greatest 

 number of desirable characteris- 

 tics, and the aim' of plant-breeding 

 bv selection is to bring about the 

 reproduction of these in ^uch a 

 way that t --i^itinue to 



brewed true to tvoe. The advantages 

 are twofold. First, that y)lants 

 raised from selected seed breed 

 truer to tvpe than those raised 

 from unsefected seed, and *.here 

 fore produce a more uniform crop; 

 and, secondly, that the ideal plant, 

 namely the one which produces the 

 jrreatest yield per acre combined 

 with hieh I c|ualitv, forms the ma- 

 jority of the plants in the field. 



MR. A. T. D. McGRATH, 



SURGEON DENTIST. 



(RepiBtered by Exaniination). 



70, ZETLAND HOUSE. 



(Opposite University). 



Only Official F. S. M. Association Dentist. 

 Hours: Daily 9 till 6, (Saturday inoluded), and 7 till 8 each evenin;:. 



TeUphone 3656. 



