ELECTRIFIED SEED.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 29 May 1919, Page 3

ELECTRIFIED SEED.

During the 1918 harvest in Great Britain some Temarkable results were obtained from " electrified seeds." Mr H. E. Fry, an electrical engineer in Dorset, England, has developed a process of stimulating seeds so that they yield healthier and more prolific crops. The process consists of soaking the seeds in a solution of common salt, sending a current of electricity through the solution, and subsequently drying the seeds. Trials have been made with electrified wheat, barley, and oats in comparison with non-electrified seed from the same sack, and sown on adjoining ground. The elactrified seeds threw up more ttraws, which were so much stronger than the normal that they withstood B fc O rto«iwhigL laid the non-electrified harveatjiifrf^Fhe gain in yi»ld per acre varfSJrinaifferent parts of the country from five to nearly 20 bushels per acre "Jo?oats, and from about five to seven bushels for wheat. Barley showed an increase of 16 bushels in another recorded case. Twenty-seyen farmers in South Devon realised an average gain per acre of £1 13s. after dedupting the cost of treatment, which is only a few shillings ijeys'ack. This, the latest British contribution to the promising science of electroculture, is being investigated by th« sub-committee of the Board of Agriculture of Great Britain, which is making a scientific study of the influence of electricity on plant life.