Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1913-07-08
THE IMPORTANCE OF SEED SELECTION g o.! g: : :

Since Burbank has made blackberries
white, plums without stones cactus
without spines, oriers without prickles,
apples without seed S, conferred fra
GRANGE wher none belonged, changed
flavor and increased sizes and yields:
since Nilsson has enlarged the heads,
strengthened the straw and rendered
oats, wheat and barley resistant to dis
ease; since numerous plant breeders
have greatly increased the yielding
quality of corn, cotton. etc, no inteIIi-
gent farmer should longer be unmind-
fuT of the pedigree OF his plants.
Plants can be bred up just as animals.
Some of the very same laws Of heredity
apply in both. To the observing, it has
always been a wonder how so many
varieties of corn, wheat, oats, cotton
and other plants came to exist Prob
ably it will always be a wonder, for
after all the origin of species is in
applicable except on the hypothesis that
a supreme intelligence just made it
that way.
No Distinct Species Produced.
Scientists have tried to explain the
origin of species and the existence of
varieties by saying that they we're
brought about by mutation or sports
that is. by sudden, sportive changes
whereby a plant got out of the groove Of
its native ways. But why the plant had
the sportive inclination and why it
should attain distinct characteristics by
reason Of the same remains a mystery.
No one has ever produced a distinct
hau vrFitn
the production of one. All that has ap-
parently been observed is the results
of crossing different species and va
rieties.
At any rate it is certain that there
are many distinct species in the world
which have fixed habits and .roduce
faithfully after their kind with ouy lin
tied variations Cross breeding alone
has been found the only effective meth
cd for changing a variety. After the
crossing has been done if care is not
taken to maintain it, the variety splits
up and reverts to its original compo-
nents.
Probers into the deep things of science
formerly believed with Darwin that the
origin of species was far back, and
selection and a survival Of the fittest to
produce species and create a change in
a variety. But now Professor Burbank
accomplishes in a summer what Darwin
thought would take millennium.
only Accidental Crossings.
What was formerly considered the
mysterious mutations are after all only
accidental or cross breedings. The head
of wheat that grew up amongst its
brethren and became larger and differ
ent was formerly thought TO be a sud
den mysterious mutation, but now it is
certain that most OF these so-called mu-
tations have resulted from a sportive
wind or a sportive insect which brought
TO the flower the fertilizing pollen from
a neighboring field, perhaps from an
other variety of the same kind Of grain,
perhaps from a different species.
1t is the introduction of a strange
breed that excited the plant to extra
production. Thereby has been unfolded
a wonderful secret looking TO increasing
the harvests.
After many years of painstaking ex-
periments in selection and trying to av-
eraSe up d Whole ASla OF gram 10 4 III
tie higher each year, and after pursuing
other wrong quests, plant breeders ev-
erywhere are now giving more attention
to cross breeding OF varieties than to
any other one thing
In this Burbank has led the world,
and. more than any one else, has Rd-
vanced the new movement OF cross
breeding. In fact, very little can be
said to have been accomplished in i'm