LUPINS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 December 1939, Page 3

LUPINS

Most people who have Russell lupins in their garden have obtained them from seed distributed from the original stock. Many who obtained seed or seedlings of this new strain anticipated that every individual would be of a quality equal to the finest spikes seen in the illustrations. Experienced horticulturists knew perfectly well that this was asking the unreasonable. Those who have had experience in breeding and developing a new strain of flowers would be well content to get two or three really high-class acquisitions among a hundred seedlings. In many cases a much higher per- ' centagc has been obtained among lupin seedlings, and on the other hand, a whole batch has been known to be renegades. The whole beauty of the race depends on what the owners do with the stock they have at present. It is easier to allow the whole advantages obtained by 20 years of close and careful scrutiny and concentrated effort, to fritter away, than to maintain the standard set in the original strain. If a batch of really good lupins

grows within a short distance of a plant or two of nondescript seedlings of no particular form or character, there is great risk that the seed saved from the choicer will have been influenced by the pollen of the inferior type. The great essential is that not only should plants of inferior quality

be ruthlessly destroyed wherever they are in the garden, but this weeding-out of wastrels should be carried on to the extent of destroying any of the Russell lupins which are not of a good form or of a pleasing colour. This should be the first step and it is most urgent in the interests of future generations of plants. One should mark, while the quality of the flower is still apparent, any variety of sufficient merit to make one anxious to run no risk of losing it. Here is where great restraint is required lest the number marked should be greater than really sterling qualities would warrant. But early next spring, when growth has advanced to the length of one’s little finger, some cuttings should bo taken of these reserved plants.