408 
FRUIT BLOSSOMS 
Enlarged section of the flower of a Bartlett pear; sp, sepal, the five sepals form the calyx or cup; v, 
petal, the five petals form the corolla or crown; the stamens consist of two parts, /, the filament or thread¬ 
like stem, and a, the anther, composed of two sacs which contain the pollen; the pistils consist of three parts, 
ov, the ovary ; st, the style, and s, the stigma ; d, the disc in which the nectar is secreted. Pollination is the 
transfer of the pollen to the rough sticky surface of the stigma. The pollen grains send out slender tubes, 
which pass down thru the style to the ovules. From the end of a tube a sperm cell passes into an ovule and 
unites with an egg cell—this is fertilization.— (After Waite.) 
should easily yield five times that amount. 
In 1892 the crop was less than 100 boxes of 
three peeks each. The trees in the orchard 
had always bloomed heavily,, and were every 
year snowy white with blossoms. It was 
clearly indicated that something was wrong. 
In three places in the orchard, where the 
trees had died, two Clapp’s Favorite and a 
Buffum tree had been planted by mistake, 
and in their vicinity the Bartletts fruited 
heavily. A small orchard containing a 
variety of trees had been very productive; 
and the Bartletts near this orchard also 
bore well. Waite determined the difficulty 
in the following way: After removing the 
stamens from a number of unopened buds 
he pollinated a part of them with pollen 
from Bartlett trees and a part with pollen 
from different varieties, and then enclosed 
them in paper bags. In the orchard at 
large, a week after the petals had fallen, 
the young pears all dropped off. Most of 
the trees were absolutely barren. Of the 
flowers enclosed in bags, not one pollinated 
with Bartlett pollen had set fruit, while a 
large proportion of the crosses with other 
varieties produced pears. As there were a 
sufficient number of insects to carry the 
pollen, it is evident that, had there been 
other varieties of pears scattered thru the 
great orchard, the crop would not have 
been a failure. The Bartlett pear is large¬ 
ly self-sterile.-^-Waite, M. B., “The Polli¬ 
nation of Pear Flowers,” Div. Veg. Path. 
Bull. No. 5, 1895; also Yearbook Dep. 
Agr., 1898. 
A pear flower remains in bloom seven or 
eight days. There are 20 stamens in four 
