Seedling Meetings 
There are four of us in the local Society who have been growing seed- 
lings for some time; and we had two seedling shows just among ourselves 
this last Fall. It is great fun to see a spike that the “other fellow” thinks 
is good. At one of our meetings we had about sixty spikes displayed and 
many of them were very fine. This is my idea of a fine Gladiolus Show. 
Everything is new, No Picardy or Peggy Lou around, no King Lear or King 
Arthur—and how I loved those four ‘“‘in their time”. But—time marches on. 
While attending the N. A. G. C. Convention in Milwaukee, last winter, 
one fellow grower came to me and asked “Did you really grow 39,000 new 
seedling bulbs this summer’. I said I surely did, and counted them. Well, 
he said, “I am sure of one thing, you are going to be looking at that lot of 
glads a LONG TIME”. How right he was. I have gotten them thru their 
first summer, but fully expect to plant them all again, except the few that 
I pulled and discarded during the season. Perhaps as many as forty per 
cent failed to bloom at all, but did make nice large bulbs that will bloom in 
1953. All the blooms will be larger this coming season, and will make it 
easier to pass judgment on them. A good many more will be set aside for 
further testing. Then again, a large number of the selections made this 
season will go into the ash-can this summer, but many will continue on 
test—and we “will see them a long time’”’. 
Then there are 15,680 new ones that we will just have to look at as they 
come into bloom. And we can hardly wait. I do want to make the seedling 
meetings oftener and more important this coming season. Mr. Otteson har- 
vested two or three thousand new ones. I know George Dubes has 1,200 
very fine bulbs to plant, and Donald Wohlers has a good bunch to plant. 
Well, we will just have to fight it out. These three are fine fellows and we 
have a swell time when we call a meeting. Mr. Otteson is the President, or 
Boss of the group. He brought over one of the finest colored pink glads 
I have ever seen, early last season—and I hope it had 3 dozen bulblets at 
least. If you grow a few seedlings, invite some other growers to bring 
theirs over and see who has the good ones! We get fooled sometimes. 
axG fobs 
