In order to attain certain desirable results in breeding pecans or other plants, all the influences of heredity and environment must be understood by the breeder. Advantage must be taken of those influences that help to attain the desired results, while hindering influences must be minimized or neutralized altogether. Many natural forces assist the breeder and the effect of these is vastly multiplied by domestication and cultivation. Those plants that have been domesticated longest are most

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... eptible to artificial improvement, because of the hereditarily accumulated influences of better environment. The pecan can hardly be said to have been domesticated, since its cultivation has been so recently begun. The possibilities of pecan breeding are necessarily largely a matter of conjecture. It seems to be worth while for us to speculate as to what we ought to attempt to accomplish in pecan breeding, and this paper must deal chiefly in such speculation because of the meagerness of actual experimental data. The first step in the breeding of any plant species is the identification and selection of wild individuals of superior merit for foundation stocks. This step has been taken with the pecan, since more than 100 meritorious varieties have been named and propagated. The next step is the change of environment such as soil, climate, and associate plants. The dissemination of the pecan has brought it into new environments, but the full effects of this feature of breeding will probably not show until several generations of trees have been propagated. The third step is artificial cross pollination for the purpose of blending the characters of two meritorious parents. Very little work of this sort has been done, although plans for crossing pecans have been devised by a number of workers. Mr. C. Forkert of Ocean Springs, Mississippi, is the only person known by the writer to have actualfy cross-pollenized the pecan. The pollen is produced in large quantities and is naturally distributed by the wind. It is a simple matter to cover the female flower with a paper sack until the appearance of the sugary secretion on the stigma indicates to the operator that the receptive period has arrived. To secure the pollen from the desirable male parent and dust it on the receptive stigma is a very simple operation in theory, but not so easily executed in the top of a tall tree as might be imagined. The female flowers are borne on the young tender shoots of the season, on the extreme outer ends, and hence are not easily reached by the operator.