THE PRINCIPLES OF SEED-TESTING 493 



supplying, e.g., mangel mixed with 25 per cent, wild beet, one 

 of the samples submitted. A Seed Station has not, as its main 

 function, the detection or prevention of fraud. 



(c) Time-Limit. — Some firms state that quite half their business 

 has to do with seed they never handle at all. Such speculative 

 trade has its risks to run, and the speculating firm which no 

 doubt receives a guarantee when buying the (foreign) supplies 

 should be prepared to have the seeds it deals in submitted 

 by the British farmer to test. 



It has been argued by some that general seed-testing would 

 paralyse the seed trade if customers waited for the results of the 

 testing before sowing. Such delay is quite unnecessary. The 

 same machinery for taking samples under the Fertilisers and 

 Feeding Stuffs Act could be utilised in preventing the postpone- 

 ment of the sowing of seeds. It is only the samples taken from 

 the bulk that are required for action under the Act. 



It is true that seeds do not ripen equally well each year. 

 Machinery exists for the removal of the unripe seeds, and there 

 are seedsmen who guarantee year by year the same percentage 

 of germination. The buyer should at any rate have the oppor- 

 tunity of knowing the germination percentage of the seed he is 

 buying. 



There could be a mutual agreement as to a unit of repayment 

 or of compensation in cases where the test showed the seeds to 

 be under or above the guaranteed standard. Such a mutual 

 arrangement has been found workable. The common law 

 could still deal with cases where there was evidence of deliberate 

 fraud. It has come to my knowledge that in England, where 

 certain landlords agree to pay half the cost of the seeds supplied 

 to their tenants, these in some cases arrange for low-priced 

 inferior seed to be actually supplied to them, while the landlord 

 pays for superior seeds and so the whole bill. The tenant does 

 not seem to realise that he more than pays for the difference 

 later on, in poorer crops. 



To meet the time difficulty attempts to ascertain the vitality 

 or viability of a seed at once have been made by the use of 

 chemical reagents. Further, Dr. Waller has shown in a very 

 interesting manner that seeds which are alive give an electrical 

 discharge which he calls a " blaze " current, when a current from 

 an induction coil is sent through the seed. He has known only 

 one case in which the seed failed to give the "blaze" current, 



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