PLANT BREEDING

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 3, 3 July 1926, Page 15

PLANT BREEDING

INTERESTING LECTTJBE.

An interesting lecture on "Plant Breeding and Pasture Improvement" was given at Canterbury College on Wednesday evening under the auspices of the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury and the Canterbury Agricultural Science Club. The lecturer was Professor B. G. Stapledon, Director of the Plant Breeding Station, Wales. Mr. C. E. Foweraker presided.

Professor Stapledon said that a tremendous amount of work had been done in England in the way of agricultural research. England and Wales spent £150,000 a year in research work. The chief scheme of research was to found a number of institutions for reference work. Many of the institutions also had endowment grants, reports the "Lyttelton Times." Great Britain was spending a' great deal more per ncre than America. All the new institutions wero run in conjunction with the universities and under the control of the Ministry of Agriculture. Great Britain was a very large grassland country, and grass and clovers produced all the agricultural wealth of Great Britain.

la England and Wales the three chief things aimed at were the ultra-scientific breeding of grasses and clovers, the selection of better or more suitable strains, and the general grass-land problems. Remarkable results had been secured by the crossing of plants. Scientific studies as to the exact times when the various plants exuded their anthers had made this possible. Perennial ryegrass and Italian ryegrass crossed easily artificially. The reason they did not cross naturally was because they did not flower at the same time. Bed clover was to all intents and purposes selfsterile, though not absolutely so. Crossfertilisation of two plants could only take place when the shedding of pollen synchronised with the ripening of the stigment. Most plants had a considerable range as regards flowering times. Duration of daylight at flowering times had a big effeot on the crossing of plants.

The lecturer, said he thought quite enough if not too much attention had been paid to soils instead of to the plants. Methods of seed production was a factor above all others. Denmark had captured the seed market of the world. In Denmark they had to make farmyard manure and hay. In New Zealand people were wonderfully well off in this respect; The Dane wanted a big seed harvest, and his method of seed production made for short havests and short-lived plants. At Akaroa the method was for longlived cocksfoot, forty, fifty, or sixty years old. In Denmark the seed was not more than three years of age, and the result was that Danish seed was infinitely superior to English or New Zealand for marketing. The same thing applied to white clover. This led to the further conclusion that sixty to sixty-five years ago the seed chain of the world was not developed. The original cocksfoot and white clover brought out here was not seed of short duration, but was wild seed. New Zealand was fortunate in this respect: Small seed was more likely to represent the perennial strains of cocksfoot and clover. The professor quoted figures in support of this contention. The discarding of small seed equalled the throwing-out of perennial strains. From a botanical point of view, there were two varieties of red clover, broad or early-flowering and lateflowering. It was possible to get a crop of hay and seed out of the broad, but not both out of the late-flowering. The first essential for the plant breeder was to_ accumulate all the types in the world it was desired to grow and then select the best. This uhould be tho work of the universities. It would be priceless, as it was time the herbage breeder should produce entirely new species of grasses for the particular district in which he resided.