70 



THE AGKICULTURAL NEWS. 



March 5, 1910. 



WEST INDIAN COTTON. 



Messrs. Wolstenholme and Holland, of Liverpool, 

 write as follows, under date February 14, with reference 

 to the sales of West Indian Sea Island cotton : — 



Since our last report, about 300 bales of West Indian 

 Sea Island cotton have been .sold, including Barbados ITirf. to 

 •20d., St. Kitts ]S<i to 20rf., :Mont.serrat 17|(7. to I9il, Nevis 

 18rf., St. Croix ISirf., and St. Vincent 20</. 



Prices are firm, and are likely to remain so, owing to the 

 high prices ruling for Egyptian cotton, the crop of which has 

 lieen a failure this year. 



The report of Messrs. Henry W. Frost, & Co., on 

 Sea Island cotton in the Southern States, for the week 

 ending February 11, is as follows: — • 



There was only a moderate demand throughout the week, 

 which was limited to Fine and Fully Fine, off in preparation, 

 at 30c., Stained and Tinged at -'Sc, and deep Stains at 27c., 

 resulting in sales of 300 bales in all, which are being .shipped 

 to Savannah and warehoused there. 



However, .since the Exchange report, large sales have 

 been made of Fully Fine and Extra Fine, at some concession 

 from previous asking prices, the buying being for export. 



We will give details in our next report. 



COTTON SEED SELECTION IN THE 

 UNITED STATES. 



Cotton-growers are by this time familiar with the 

 methods of cotton seed selection that have been advised 

 for adoption in the West Indies. The following extracts 

 from a leaflet, just issued by the Bureau of Plant 

 Industry of the United States Department of Agri- 

 culture, and entitled DistriJmtion of Seed-Cotton in 

 JOlO, will serve to show that these methods are similar 

 to those in vogue in that country, and to give some 

 points of further interest in connexion with the matter. 

 Among these, the planting of seed from selected plants 

 in what are termed ' progeny rows' appears to be 

 specially useful: — 



Two methods of cotton seed selection have been used 

 in the past — ' mass selection' and ' individual selection'. In 

 the first, the planter picks enough of his best plants to 

 furnish seed for his next year's planting. 'I'his may be done 

 by his most experienced picker, or by the planter him.self, 

 and the amount of seed-cotton thus selected is sufficient to 

 be ginned at the ordinary customs gin. The gains by this 

 method are ample to pay for the expenses incurred, and in the 



hands of an exceptional man, may give very good results; but 

 they are not so sure, or so rapid, as those by individual selection. 

 In individual selection, the planter takes greater care in 

 selecting his plants, and instead of picking all the selections 

 together, he numbers each plant by a tag, and picks the seed- 

 cotton into a bag numbered correspondingly. 



This seed is planted in separate rows during the next year. 

 The plot selected for this work should be as uniform as poss- 

 ible, and of high fertility. The seed will have to be sown by 

 hand. It is not necessary to delint it, but it is well 

 to immerse tlie seed-cotton in water, just before i)lanting. If 

 half a lock of this wet cotton is dropped every 2 feet in the 

 row, and coveied with an inch or two of loose soil with the 

 feet, and then trodden upon, a good stand is almost certain. 

 These rows should be given the same numbers a;; the parent 

 plants, and are called ' progeny rows'. 



The reason for planting in progeny rows is that not all 

 good cotton stalks ha^■e the power to transmit their 

 qualities to their progeny. In other words, a good stalk may 

 be so by inheritance, or it may be really very ordinary, owing 

 its good qualities to some advantage in soil, fertilizer, or 

 cultivation, which neighbouring plants have failed to get. 

 Probably no one ever becomes well enough acquainted with 

 cotton to be able to recognize this distinction in any givea 

 case. 



A surprise is in store for the man who plants, in progeny 

 rows, the twenty-five best plants he c>in find, this surprise 

 consisting, firstly, in the apparent uniformity of the plants 

 in each row; and, secondly, in tiie wide variation between 

 those in adjacent rows. By this means, one is enabled to 

 discard all the progeny of those plants which fail in any 

 character. Without progeny rows, it is impossible to elimin- 

 ate these undesirable plants so thoroughly. 



To select for productiveness, plants which have givea 

 a larger yield than their neighbours, without any 

 evident advantage as to soil, space or fertilizer, should be 

 chosen. The poorest part of the field is just as good for this 

 selection as the best, except that, among the stunted plants 

 on poor soil, the individual differences do not usually show so 

 plainly as where the cotton plants have made a better growth. 

 The cotton stalk which has ripened eight bolls, while the neigh- 

 bouring stalks, with the same apparent opportunit}', ripened 

 five, is as much to be selected for productivity as the one hav- 

 ing forty bolls among plants bearing twenty-five. 



In making selections for greater length of lint, it is well 

 to have a comb on which a 2|-inch scale, divided into 

 sixteenths, is marked. The lint is combed out on the seeds, 

 and enough is then pulled of}' to be measured on the scale. 

 The lint should be of uniform length all over the seed. 

 Sometimes the lint is shorter on the pointed end, which 

 defect is important, as it makes more waste in the pro- 

 cess of spinning. 



