EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 357 



soil, and treatment. The kinds popularly esteemed a few years ago, Peach- 

 blow, Eiose, Snowflake, etc., have been discarded, and new varieties have 

 taken their places. Other vegetables — peas, cabbage, corn, beans — are 

 perpetuated for many years by judicious selection, growing even better 

 oftentimes. Why not the potato? The reasons are, largely, the abnormal 

 conditions under which they are grown; their instability, because of com- 

 paratively recent introduction, and the fact that propagation by tubers is 

 not properly reproduction, but simply plant division. Still, it seems that 

 their rapid deterioration might at least be checked by careful selection of 

 seed. This year a small experiment was tried to determine whether a 

 continued selection, year after year, of best potatoes from best hills, might 

 not keep a variety from deteriorating. 



The best potatoes and the ordinary potatoes from four varieties were 

 grown under like conditions. It was hardly expected that the first year 

 would show very positive results, yet some gain is shown for the selected 

 seed, both in quality and quantity, there being a marked difference in the 

 appearance of the tubers, in favor of those from the selected seed. 

 Briefly, the results were as follows: 129 hills from selected seed, embrac- 

 ing four varieties, yielded at the rate of 114 bushels per acre; 139 hills 

 from ordinary seed yielded at the rate of 105^ bushels per acre, the 

 tubers of the first, as was before stated, being much superior to those of 

 the latter. The experiment will be continued for several years. The 

 potato crop in this country is now of such vast importance that, however 

 small it may be, anything done to perpetuate a really good variety is a 

 general benefit to the people as a nation. 



HEAVY AND LIGHT SEEDING. 



"The more seed planted the larger and better the crop," has become 

 almost an axiom with many farmers. Tabulated statements from various 

 stations prove this to be true. Previous bulletins from this station have 

 treated the subject fully and it needs only a word here. The claims of those 

 who advocate the planting of from 30-50 bushels of seed to the acre, however, 

 need to be taken with a grain of allowance. It is true that the yield may 

 be somewhat larger, but the proportion of small potatoes is always greater 

 and, since the cost of seed, the extra work, the fertility of the soil, and 

 various minor matters must be taken into consideration, it is doubtful if 

 such heavy seeding pays. A cursory glance at the conclusions reached by 

 experimenters along this line, shows that most of them favor planting 

 potatoes of medium size or pieces with two or more eyes, from one to t^o 

 feet apart. 



Small experimental plots, with large potatoes and those of medium size, 

 gave the following results the past season: Six varieties, of 215 hills, large 

 seed at the rate of 30 bushels per acre, yielded at the rate of 109.6 bushels 

 of large potatoes per acre, and 16.3 bushels of small ones. The same six 

 varieties with 225 hills, with seed of medium size or small, at the rate of 

 ten bushels per acre, yielded 100.5 bushels per acre of large potatoes and 

 14 bushels of small ones; the gain per acre from the use of large tubers 

 being less than the increased amount of seed. Taking everything into 

 account, the result is in favor of the medium-size potatoes, with about 

 twenty bushels as the maximum seeding. 



