The National Nurseryman. 
FOR GROWERS AND DEALERS IN NURSERY STOCK. 
Copyright, 1901, by the National Nurseryman Publishing Co. 
“ Violent crosses produce untold defects in fruits and plants ” —Charles G. Patten. 
Vol. IX. ROCHESTER, N. Y., JUNE, 1901. No. 6. 
PROPAGATING FROM SEEDS 
Serious Mistakes Due to Overlooking the Fact that Violent 
Crosses Produce Untold Defects in Fruits and Plants—Belief 
that Practice of Emasculating Stamens and Cutting Off 
Petals in Pollinizing is Faulty—Leave Flower Intact. 
In the course of an article by Charles G. Patten, Charles 
City, la , published in the Minnesota Horticulturist, on “ Prop¬ 
agating New Varieties of Tree Fruits from Seed, Mr. Patten 
says: 
“We know but little of the ancestry of our fruit trees, and 
so we have need to be wiser and more thoughtful than the 
stockgrower. To breed improved fruits for this climate every 
element of perfection in tree and fruit that it is possible to 
find should be brought together. Hardiness, freedom from 
blight, vigor, leaves,that are resistant to unfavorable combina¬ 
tions of heat and moisture, fruits that hang well to the tree 
until mature, good size, freedom from defect in skin, beauti¬ 
ful, productive and of as good quality as possible. Such a 
tree should hold its leaves for a normal length of season for 
the latitude in which we are working. Judged by these 
points, the Oldenburg and Hibernal are defective, for they 
both drop their leaves seven to ten days earlier than they 
should in the average season, and both also drop their fruit too 
easily. Our northern native plums are defective in dropping 
their fruit and shedding their leaves too early, and I have no 
doubt that these defects will be improved upon by crossing 
them with the Miner plum and some of its seedlings. 
“ Innumerable and serious mistakes have been made all 
over the northwest in an endeavor to mingle the little Siberian 
with our cultivated apple, forgetting that violent crosses pro¬ 
duce untold defects in fruits and plants as well as in animals. 
Some of our most noted originators of new plums here in 
the west are, I fear, making this mistake, getting too far away 
from line breeding and mixing widely distinct types. What 
was once one of the most important stock centers of the west 
for high bred cattle has greatly deteriorated on account of this 
mixing process. A little Holstein, a little Short Horn, a little 
Polled Angus, and a little Jersey has wrought the mischief. 
“ The mixing process is a scattering and diluting process 
nearly every time. In improving the apple for Minnesota 
and the Northwest, we must have hardiness. Then, says 
one, we must go back to the Siberian. Not so, for it has been 
demonstrated by actual experiment that some of the third 
hybrids, like Whitney’s No. 20 and Briar’s sweet that are 
at least seventy-five per cent., apple will produce seedlings 
that are hardy and more free from defects than where the old 
Siberians were crossed with the apple. So that if we 
would make an all-around advance with the apple, one of the 
parents should be such advanced hybrids as Sweet Russet, 
Minnesota, and Meader’s Winter, and better, if you know 
them, being sure that they hold both leaves and fruit reason¬ 
ably well, and first rate, if possible. However, holding a large 
part of the leaves too late would be an indication of im¬ 
maturity. 
The seeming advantage that the stock men have with their 
highest developed breeds may be more seeming than real. 
The horticulturist has at least this advantage, that when he 
has once secured a Concord or a Worden grape, or a Wealthy 
apple, he can multiply them by the millions and have them 
exactly alike, while the stock breeder can only rarely exceed 
the high average of his herd, even with the most thoughtful 
care, and at best his failures will be considerable. 
And there is still another feature that most horticulturists 
have overlooked in the production of new varieties ; namely, 
that such plants and trees as the Concord and Worden grapes, 
the Ben Davis, Wine Sap, Fameuse, Duchess, Wealthy and 
the Patten’s Greening apples and the Richmond cherry are 
the crowning results in horticultural evolution. They are to 
horticulture, whether produced by natural or artificial selec¬ 
tion or development, what the Morgan horse is to horse 
breeders, Stoke Pogis 3 rd to the dairymen and Bates and 
Cruickshank Short Horns to the producer of beef cattle. 
Such plants and trees are even more than thoroughbreds. 
They are the highest types of their race. They are the culmi¬ 
nation of all the cumulative forces toward a higher perfection 
in horticulture. They are the prepotent individuals that estab¬ 
lish breeds and families in fruits. Their seedlings are often 
as pronouncedly stamped as are the offspring of the Holstein 
or the Jersey cattle. And if horticulturists would pay atten¬ 
tion to the scientific laws of development and breed from 
such plants, we would hear less about the deteriorating forces 
of reversion to lower ancestral types, and our table would not 
be burdened with a multitude of small and worthless fruits. 
Of course, if we plant the seeds of inferior seedlings and 
their crosses, that fairly represent generations of worthless 
fruits behind them, the law of reversion will be strikingly 
manifest. 
On the grounds of the writer are seedlings of known par¬ 
entage already in bearing. Such as Duchess crossed with 
Grimes’ Golden, Patterns Greening and Grimes’ Golden, Pink 
Anis and Jonathan, Maiden Blush and a Duchess seedling— 
a cross of fall Pippin and Duchess—and Briar’s Sweet with 
Pound Sweet and Wolf River also, and so on. Also four or 
five grand-seedlings of the Duchess with parentage partly 
known. 
When we know that in such crosses as Duchess and Grimes’ 
Golden we have hardiness and excellence of fruit combined, 
why not pollinize that tree with its own pollen, or pollen of 
the Patten’s Greening and Grimes’ Golden cross, instead of 
taking chances of dissipating and scattering the forces that we 
have already combined with the uncertain pollen of any other 
variety. 
According to the written experience of Mr. Budd, the 
