Wrote Letter L-537 of 1716-06-22 to Jan Gerard Kerkherdere about how wheat, barley, beans, peas, rice, buckwheat, and maize become food for animals and discusses Leeuwenhoek's techniques for preparing samples

Date: 
June 22, 1716
Standard reference information
L-number: 
L-537
Leeuwenhoek's number: 
XXVI
Collected Letters number: 
325
Collected Letters volume: 
18

Text of the letter in the original Dutch and in English translation in Alle de Brieven / The Collected Letters is not yet available at the DBNL - De Digitale Bibliotheek voor de Nederlandse Letteren.

The original manuscript is lost.

Leeuwenhoek continued his investigations of how plants germinate and begin to grow. He wrote:

my insignificant work ... originates merely from the propensity I have to investigate the first beginnings of all created things.