96 REPORT OF THE AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE 



mixture. This he hopes to supplant in time with 

 Mr. Leake's improved red-flowered cotton ; the extension of 

 Bhuri as a higher class cotton in the favourable localities; 

 a possible improvement of one yellow-flowered indigenous 

 cotton at least. 



Distribution of improved seed. It is satisfactory to 

 note that this has received careful attention and I approve 

 of the method now being worked out by Dr. Parr in the 

 Western Circle. In this there are a large number of 

 spring wells, giving a discharge of from 8,000 to 20,000 

 gallons an hour. It has been shown that this water can 

 be raised more cheaply by oil-engines and centrifugal 

 pumps than by bullocks. As a result, a large number of 

 zamindars and cultivators are putting down pumping 

 plants on their wells. Government is assisting by giving 

 takavi for this purpose. These installations are doing 

 very useful work directly, that is, in pumping water 

 cheaply. They are also going to prove extremely useful in 

 facilitating the supply of improved seed introduced by the 

 Department. I will confine my further remarks to the 

 needs of the cotton crop. Many of these oil-engine owners 

 are being induced to put down cotton gins. At present it 

 is hoped that for every one hundred thousand acres of 

 cotton grown, there will be about twenty-five oil-engines, 

 each with a cotton gin attached. The oil-engines vary in 

 size according to the amount of water in the wells and the 

 depth of the water from the surface, but each will command 

 on an average about fifty acres of cotton, that is to say, 

 there will be twenty-five seed-farms each growing fifty 

 acres of cotton or a total of 1,250 acres. The produce of 

 this area will sow about 18,750 acres in the following year 

 so that these seed farms will supply seed to the total area 

 of one hundred thousand acres once in about five years. No 

 hard and fast rule need be laid down. If it seems advisable 

 to cover the area more often, many more centres where 

 pumping installations are working, will be available. To 

 supply the twenty-five seed farms or the total private seed- 

 farm area of 1,250 acres, an area of eighty acres will be 



