MODERN AGRICULTURE.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1814, 29 July 1913, Page 8

MODERN AGRICULTURE.

ELIMINATING XflD UNFIT. , | In every department of farm work there ijs a genera! awakening to the need for : improvement in methods of production. J Tins awakening i 9 not confined to any par- ; ticular country, although some countries j have realised their opportunities somewhat in advance of otliere. The older ! countries have found the necessity for the application of scientific principles in rural economy more pressing .than liavo tho more recently settled portion of the globe, where land is choap and the natural fertility of the soil has not been exhausted. During the last ten years a great change has been introduced, and even farmers of practically virgin country find that the practices in voguo a generation ago are not in keeping with present-day requirements. Land values, labour problems, and the demand for produce of iiigh quality make it imperative that either tho cost of production must be reduced or that the yields must be increased. "While the wit and resource of the inventor on the ono hand is devising laboureaving machinery, tho progressive and enlightened farmer on'the other hand is, with tho assistance of tho scientist, solving the problem of increasing the output and combating diseases in stock and produce that militate against complete success in farming operations. That is why experimental tests are made with grain and root crops; it accounts for the existence of cow-testing associations and societies for preserving the best interests of various kinds of stock. It suggests tho reason why associations are necessary for preserving tho purity of seed-stocks, of coreals, and the necessity for replacing them with new and improved varieties with characteristics suitable to tho environment <of the country and the purpose for which the resultant yield will be.used. There seems to be no limit to the possibilities that may be accomplished, particularly in the vegetable kingdom, along the line of plant improvement by the selection and breed-ing-\ip of specimens of plants of individual merit. In iVew Zealand a good start has been made with this important work by the State. One remarkable instance of what may be accomplished by careful selection of grain stocks is provided by the work performed by Professor lv. A. lloore, of the Agricultural College at Madison, Wisconsin, in the United States. Starting with forty selected groins representing three varieties of barley eight years ago, the professor has produced a sufficient stock of pedigree J>ar!ey to provide seed of guaranteed quality to sow the one million aore3 that ore devoted to the cultivation of malting barley in the State of ; Wisconsin. A dozen years ago practically all that was known in Wisconsin about barley was that its principal use wa9 for brewers' malt. That it might havo two, four, or six rows of grain to the head; that it was sometimes bearded and sometimes beardless. But when it came to telling the difference between good and bad barley— that is, barley that could tbe depended upon, and do what was required of it, nobody knew how. Barley was just barley, It frequently happened that when the barley got to tho malting, floor it germinated so irregularly that considerable loss was entailed, because the growing crops had ripened irregularly. Professor Mooto est himself'to remedy these defects, also to try and breed up a barley that would not only fill the requirements of the malster, but, in addition, would be free from the defects of many varieties of barley used in the manufacture of "pearl barley." It appears that in the pearling process a largo proportion of the grains of ordinary nondescript barley turn blue, and have to bo picked out by hand at considerable trouble and expense. Tests made at the end of the third year proved that one of the three varieties of barley not only filled the requirements of the malster, but the maker of pearl barley as well. By planting the graiii 1 selttok ed from the best heads every year until the seventh season, there was sufficient seed for twenty "acres. _ At this stage a Seed Experiment Association was formed, consisting of 1500 farmers, who each agreed to plant a patch of pedigree seed, and harvest the crop under conditions ' that would make contamination with worthless grain impossible. Thus, when the crops for that season were, harvested there was sufficient pedigreed barley 011 hand not only to fill all the requirements of the State, but to furnish a considerable quantity for export. It is the first barley grown in Wisconsin that the malster has been able to depend upon to germinate uniformly without loss. It is the first barley that farmers there have beon able to grow with a certainty of full crops running upward of thirty-six bushels to the acre and all ripening at the same time. And, incidentally, it is tho first barley that the millers could use for "pearling" without any of tho grains turning blue. The average yield of tho new variety over the one million acres has been six bushels per aero more than formerly, besides the distinct advantage in other directions. Translated into figures, this means that tho same average as was devoted to barley in tho past will now yield six million bushels more grain, valued at over a quarter of a million pounds sterling, all as tho result of section. In view of the annual los 9to this Dominion through blights and constitutional weakness in cereals, there is a great field open to the plant-breeder. Farmers could materially assist those who are now at work by preserving the seed from any plant of outstanding merit, and sending it along to be investigated at one or other of the plant-breeding stations.