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Linen Flax.—A rust-immune strain of Liral Crown is to be built up from crosses that have been made between the present susceptible strain and tested immune selections from the Russian and Argentine varieties. This will give an alternative to fall back on in case the Russian selection should prove disappointing in fibre-production. Linseed— Golden Viking gives an excellent yield of high-quality oil, but deteriorates rather rapidly in a wet harvest, is a little late maturing for some districts, is susceptible to pasmo, and has recently proved susceptible to one race of rust. Cheyenne is an early-maturing variety producing good-quality seed, but its yield is not as high as that of the later varieties. It is immune to rust, and fairly tolerant of pasmo. Rio is a late-maturing variety, highly resistant to rust, browning, and wilt. It is, however, rather susceptible to pasmo, and has not yielded very well in trials. These three varieties are being combined in a triple cross, with the object of producing an early-maturing, high-yielding variety, resistant to rust, browning, wilt, and pasmo, that will withstand bad harvest conditions. Lupins.—Much lupin-seed is lost at harvest through shattering. A nonshattering selection of sweet yellow lupin with white seed is now being increased as rapidly as possible. The sweet white-flowered lupin has been crossed with the bitter pink to incorporate in the former the early vigour and soft seed-coat of the latter. Peas.—A Greenfeast pea has been developed that is resistant to pea-mosaic. This will go into field trials next season. Pea-wilt (Fusarium orthoceras) causes serious losses in some districts; breeding for resistance to this disease is in progress, using resistant parents from America in crosses with New Zealand varieties of field and garden peas. Work is being continued on the production of: (a) a pea as early as William Massey, but with a better yield; (5) a higher-yielding, earlier, Blue Prussian; and (c) a smooth-seeded, early, evenly-maturing Partridge. None of the previous attempts to achieve this has been successful. Indeed, the dimpled character seemed to be so closely linked with the Partridge-type seed-coat that they appeared to be inseparable. However, the desired combination has now been produced in a cross between Partridge and Black-eyed Susan, and selections will shortly be tested for yield. Lucerne.—-Work is in progress to improve still further the performance of New Zealand certified lucerne, which was bred by the Agronomy Division and tested under the name " Strain B." There is widespread interest in the possibility of producing a lucerne that will stand up to hard grazing. The most promising variety—Medicago glutinosa ■ —will probably stand hard grazing, but gives rather a low yield of forage and a very low yield of seed. Crosses have been made between New Zealand certified lucerne and M. glutinosa in an attempt to combine the desirable characters of both parents. New introductions of creeping lucernes from Canada are under test, and it is hoped that some of these may prove more satisfactory than those already tried. RESEARCH ON VEGETABLE CROPS Survey of Varieties.—A great range of varieties and strains of vegetables has been examined over the past three years for varietal purity and suitability for New Zealand conditions. This range of material has been obtained both from overseas and New Zealand sources, and has consisted mainly of strains and varieties of broccoli (winter cauliflower), savoy, summer cabbage, spring cabbage, cauliflower, beans, lettuce, carrot, tomatoes, and sweet corn, as well as other subsidiary crops. The total number grown and examined of samples of commercial seed is approximately 1,800.

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