SEED SELECTION.

Otago Witness, Issue 2813, 12 February 1908, Page 6

SEED SELECTION.

At harvest time is no doubt the best time to select seed for future growing. It is when the corn is ripe that the best ears, from plants that 'have the most numerous stalks, can be gathered and carefully stored for further examination. At one* time many farmers had an idea that small grains were the best seed, as there were more of them to the bushel, and the sowers looked to them to produce more plants to a given area than would spring from the fewer large grains. That idea is exploded, and the advantages of sowing plump, well-ripened seed are recognised by everyone. The .heavy seed may not produce so many plants, but those which are produced are stronger, stool out into a greater numbeF of stalks, and yield a larger quantity of a much better sample of grain. Few farmers give much thought or care to the selection of seed, though they are more partcular to sow good seed than they used to be. Dressed seed, from which the small and shrivelled grains have been removed by machinery, is very generally used, many farmers having one or another of these machines, which are really indispensable on a farm, where home-grown seed is used. The surest foundation of a good stiaiu of \\heat ; oats, or other grain, is

to select every year some large, "wellfilled ears, true to the type ov variety, to form the base of a supply. The results which can be arrived a± in a very few years from beginning in this way are almost incredible. It is a historical fact that all the millions of bushels of Red Fife wheat now grown in the Canadian North-West originated from a single plant found by Mr David Fife in a wheat field in Ontario in 1842. Another wellauthenticated fact is that a Canadian farmer last year offered for sale 500 J bushels of a selected strain of wheat, all of which was the product of a single head of wheat selected five j-ears before. The seed-breeders know the value of perfect seed as the foundation for a strain, as was seen at the recent National Corn Exhibition im Chicago. At that event, which has had a great influence in improving the maize crop of the United States— and. indeed, of the world — the prize samples belong to the promoters of the exhibition, and are put up for sale by auction. The ear which gained the champion prize was bought by the man who grew it who won prizes to the value of over £1500 at the exhibition, and who declined to let such a perfect ear of seed corn get into other hands. The ear, including the cob, weighed 230z, and contained i 257 grains, and" the price which the grower paid for it was equal to Is Id for each grain, and about £3000 per bushel. The Canadian Department of Agriculture, beginning with a few ears of selected grain, has giown them on until quantities sufficient for field sowing as ere produced, ar.d distributed these in packets containing 51b of wheat or 41b of oats to farmers who applied for them and undertook to grow them carefully for seed. By this means the average \-iefd of the cereals has been enoimously increased and the quality greatly improved. Last year upwards of 45,000 farmers applied for packets of these selected seeds, so that the work of that ereat Department is well appreciated. The method of selection is simple : At harvest-time the grower, or his wife or children, go into the field armed with scissors or shears and provided with Targe envelopes or small bags, and clip and place in these receptacles the best ears they can find. When harvest is over the eais are carefully examined, and any which are imperfect or otherwise undesirable are rejected. The reserved ears are shelled by hand, and the best grains selected, and in due time planted in a well-prepared seed-bed. At e\ cry stage care is taken that no admixture" of othei kinds takes place. When the produce is ripe, all stalks and plants which are not of robust gi^wth and with heavy ears are cut out and the survivors aie harvested, 100 ears being placed in each envelope. The envelopes are weighed, and the highest thrown out. The ears in the remaining envelopes are then examined and carefully culled, and so the process goes on for four or five years, by which time sufficient seed has been raised to sow a field crop, and if this proves satisfactory distribution to farmers begins. Selection of ears from the standing corn is preferred, but good results have also been obtained by selecting the best grains from the bulk wheat in winter time. Of course, all the selections do not result successfully, but when care is taken there are few failures. The first or foundation selections of wheat generally consists of 10,000 grains, which are planted singly in hills four inches apart by a nursery planting machine. The threshing, when the yield becomes too large to be dealt with by rubbing-out, is generally' done by placing the ears in a bag, beating with a stick,

and then fanning until most of the chaff is got rid of. There is nothing very arduous in the process, and, as we have seen, the results are enormously profitable.