PICKLING AND PREPARING SEED.

Dunstan Times, Issue 537, 2 August 1872, Page 2

PICKLING AND PREPARING SEED.

A late number of the Meiboimie Leader s. ys : - It is needless here to waste time speculating on the way in which the picking of seeil-graiu acts in the prevention of loss, and in fact causes an increase of crop. Whether it be by destroying the gennsoi fungoid life, or by destroying entirely grain the produce of a diseased parent, and con* sequel; tly possessing a weakly constitution, it matters not- Many incline to the former, and some not without a good show of reason to the latter opinion. It is enough however to known that experience has allowed the practice. We may therefore rest assured that pickling seed grain does good, and leave science at its leisure to propound the theory of a practice which has ex-H istcd from the earliest times. The chances are that the pickling of seed acts in boctHs the ways named—killing fungus germs nndSl weakly grain. The old-fashioned dressinnllß were stale urine or salt water, drying (teEn seed after steeping with quick-lime, andpl these served the purpose. The popular! dressing now is bluestone (sulphate of dissolved in water. At the rate of Gib. oipj bluestone to 24 gallons of water wiU mating a solution of the required strength. Warning water dissolves the bluestone most readily, therefore a gallon or so is usually heatera for the purpose. The common practice isK to spread the grain on a floor of wood tfß|l stone, pour the solution of bluestone overate it, and keep turning and mixing the until every grain Iras become thorougWjH wetted. A more certain plan, however,Blt is to get a cask large enough, fix a gu.imßaß bag on a hoop wider than the cask, drop tkHl gunny baginto the cask containing tbeliquid,H fro loop reding over the edge of it, pour the graitr slowly into the gunny baglHi of any light floating grains, sottce the V ; Hi and its contents a few times in the liquid.Hl thou ra : se the hag, and to prevent waste eng the mixture, allow it to drip irrto tire ct sI.BS This done, the grain may be emptied out ciHa the floor, and the same operation repiateilß unt'l all the seed required has hoett ally dressed. As the liquid wastes hluestorro atrd water in the proportion®® ab-eady mentioned. We have gone ratlretHj minutely into the details of this operation. because of its importance. Tire dressing <9B seed grain is too often done in a way thatsHl calculated to deceive, that is, it is not doctH thoroughly,”.