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H/5/1965-1-

May 4-1965 - In our 102nd Year
At "The Cottage" with Mary Moore Miller

In the perfect weather, after a delightful stroll around a well-
kept garden in prolific bloom, and having partaken of the usual well-
balanced "pot-luck" meal, of which there is always too much, our
President, Ulric Hutton called the Horticultural Society to order at
7:50 p.m. We noter with regret the absence of our past President,
Jack Bentley, altho his place was taken by his sister-in-law, Miss
Esther Murray. Other absentees were Rust and Liz Canby, Herry and
Flora Goff, Vernon and Carline Hussman, Ellis and Lucy Manning and
Francis and Grace Thomas, but we were glad to welcome as guests our
friends and former members, Raymond and Ruch Havens.

The minutes of the previous meeting were read and approved
with a minor change. It was suggested that the Secretary use full
names in the minutes for the future benefit of posterity.

Helen Bentley, our reader, presented an article written by
her nephew, Charles B Wilson of the Joseph Harris Seed Company, on
the modern as well as ancient science of plant breeding. Almost
every vergetable we grow began with primitive man's selection of
a barely edible weed. As an example you may compare the wild carrot,
or Queen Anne's Lace, with the carrots we grow and eat today, then
you begin to realize the extent to which this accomplishment has
grown. Selection and hybridization, or controlled crossing, are the
basic tools of the modern plant breeder, and the hybridization is a
technique that has been developed only within the past fifty years.
Victor R Boswell, Head of Vegetable Crops Research at the U.S. Dept
of Agriculture, has said, "Man adds nothing to the hereditary makeup
of the world of plants, but he does take advantage of the endless
diversity nature provides."

The article goes on to state that selection is elimination
with that extra sense of instinct the gifted plant breeder brings
to his work. This is a never-ending process, and six or seven plant
generations later, the breeder can pretty well determine whether his
program will be successful. Fortunately, he can usually observe two
generations of plants a year, by growing one in the North and one in
the South. All of which led Ulric to remark that he had seen this
evidence when he visited Western Colorado; one crop of a certain
species was being raised in Paonia and another down in South America.
Betty Ligon told of the radish farms in Florida ordering and using
as much as five tons of radish seed a season.

Our Forethought reader, Bea Wilson, with gentle persuasion to
continue this year, produced an article suggesting that we plant our
"cool weather" corps now (can this be done in our present 90° heat?)
and also pull weeds by hand. It is now time to use either a "sticker"
or a "spreader" spray on the foliage. Another article told of the
menace to evergreens by the Black Vine Weevil, which can practically
defoliate rhododendrons and is also injurious to azaleas, false cypress,
yews and others. These weevils do not fly but crawl from one
plant to another, so control is best done in this stage by spraying
foliage and ground very thoroughly in June and early July with chlordane;
one teaspoon of 76% emulsion to one gallon of water is the best
mixture. 5% chlordane dust, heptachlor, aldrin, malathion or dieldrin
may be used to good advantage.