^^^^ ^ R. M. Kcliogg-s Gre^t Crops cf 
PLANT SELECTION. 
We do not guess a plant we propagate from is the best. We know it and prove it. Its points of ex- 
cellence are determined by a scale of hundredths just as a poultry judge scales the points in a chicken. 
Actual measurements and percentage is made at different periods and thus the varieties are all renewed 
from "Premium takers" each year. This is what we call thoroughbreeding. 
These have no organism for converting grain 
and grass into fine succulent steaks. Every- 
thing goes to skin, bone and gristle. The ani- 
mals on the opposite page are pedigree ani- 
mals because their breeding was directed by a 
skillful man and are thoroughbred because 
thoroughly developed in the higher qualities 
as well as pure in blood. What a wide differ- 
ence there is in the flesh of these two animals. 
There is the same difference in plants. One, 
through scientific treatment, selection, restric- 
tion, proper environments and accumulations 
of good variations is said to be thoroughbred 
and the pedigree or description of each an- 
cestor shows that it has been carried on long 
enough to fix these features in the plant so it 
will be transmitted. 
Since all our plants are bred in this way we 
have adapted a trade mark which is protected 
by common law and designates the stock we 
furnish as "Pedigree Thoroughbred Plants," 
to designate them from scrub plants or those 
grown like the wild cattle of the plains. 
OUR BREEDING PLANTS. 
We are now familiar with the physical or- 
ganism of plants and are prepared to learn 
how the plant can be improved. 
It is a law of nature that any faculty of 
body or mind which is never used shall be 
taken away. We must use it or lose it. We 
send our children to school where their brain.s 
shall be systematically exercised to acquir-; 
power to solve intricate problems. A child 
never allowed this privilege could never be- 
come a mental giant. To develop their mus- 
cle and physical powers we send them to the 
gymnasium. 
To develop and bring out a fruit orsfanisin in 
a plant you must exercise it in that direction. 
It is doing that develops, but note the especial 
point that excessive doing destroys the tis- 
sues. Our asylums are full of people whose 
brain power has been destroyed by excessive 
thinking. There are scores of persons who 
have been ruined by overwork. The friction 
arising out of it is greater than the gland sys- 
tem can replace. 
It is exactly so with the plant. It overworks 
its fruit producing organism and must be re- 
strained (restricted) to the ability of its gland 
system to replace the parts worn out and so 
long as this is done the plant will grow strong- 
er, but when you pass that line it will grow 
weaker and waste away. 
V/ e have already explained that plants possess 
the same violent passion for breeding through 
the sexes as is possessed by animals and that 
this drained the sources of life itself and 
would eventually make the plant impotent or 
lose the ability to fruit at all. 
We propagate continuously from bearing 
plants, but they are restricted to the point 
where strength accumulates, for the purpose 
of securing the betterment of our stock plants 
as well as in the after multiplication, they are 
grown under the most favorable conditions 
known to the horticultural art. Absolutely no 
expense is spared which in our judgment would 
contribute to their betterment and yet under 
these favorable environments some will im- 
prove faster than others and so the scale of 
perfection is advanced materially by selection. 
We can improve strawberries faster than any 
other perennial because through runners we 
get new creations every year. 
Notice the photograph. The plants have a 
lineage of nineteen years or since the intro- 
duction of the variety in which each genera- 
tion came from an ideal, selected, restricted 
plant and are therefore not only perfect in 
12 
