I speak of the matter as parthenogenesis in advance of microscopic examination of the ovules,--which will be made next year; but parthenogenesis seems to be the most likely explanation. If this is the case, the embryo has not been formed by the conjugation of two gametes, as generally occurs in the algae and higher plants. It is possible that the embryo in the unpollenized chinkapins does not originate from the female gamete at all, but that it originates from a formative budding of other cells in the ovule. We can speak of parthenogenesis only when the embryo originates from a female gamete alone, _i. e._, without fusing of protoplasmic mass of the female gamete with protoplasmic mass of the male gamete. Some of the nuts which I am calling parthenogens have developed plants this year. The chief peculiarity to be observed is great disparity in size between plants of the same age from the same parent tree. Some of them grow very much more rapidly than the average plant of the species, and others less rapidly when subjected to similar conditions of soil, temperature and moisture. We assume in biology that one of nature's objects in having two sexes is to prevent early senescence of the allotment of protoplasm for a species, and to avoid undue intensification of characteristics of one parent. This is apparently nature's device for maintaining a mean type. For man's purposes we may now make artificial selection of individual plants which represent intensification of desirable characteristics of one parent. The growing of trees from unfertilized ovules will apparently open an entirely new field in horticulture, and no one can prophesy the result of selection of trees which present intensification of desirable characteristics of a single parent through several successive generations. THE POSSIBILITIES OF NUT CULTURE IN UTAH LEON D. BATCHELOR, UTAH