An Evolut ionary Plant Breeding Method

N ideas for expanding world food production are needed. A "new" method of plant breeding that is uniquely efficient, and adaptable to the varied skills and facilities at both central and branch experiment stations is proposed. It requires assembly and study of seed stocks with diverse evolutionary origins, recombination by hybridization, the bulking of the F^ progeny, and subsequent prolonged natural selection for mass sorting of the progeny in successive natural cropping environments. Accumulated results with four different hybrid populations, continued in bulk far beyond the generation requirement for practical homozygosity, all show extreme progress in increasing yield and adaptation by this method. Previously two other populations gave similar results (13).