VARIETIES OF WHEAT. 



345 



Society's premium list would supply the want that we undertook 

 the experiments, the details of which form the body of this report. 



It has been found that seed of English growth is more pro- 

 ductive, and yields a better quality of grain, than home-grown 

 seed ; and the custom of importing seed from Essex, or some 

 other of the southern counties, is almost universal. This practice 

 is very good evidence, if evidence were wanting, of the fact that 

 the productive qualities of a variety are impaired or improved 

 by the circumstances under which it is grown — a phenomenon 

 which perhaps has not yet received the attention it merits, but 

 which should make us careful of placing too much reliance on the 

 results of experiments in which different varieties are compared. 



We ordered all the seed for the following experiments 

 from Messrs Peter Lawson & Son, Seedsmen, Edinburgh, 

 explained to them the object in view, and desired them to 

 exercise care in obtaining the varieties true to their kind, and 

 all grown as near to each other as possible. 



On the next page we have tabulated the temperature and 

 rainfall in each week from March to September inclusive in 

 both years, and also a comparison of the seasons 1864 and 1865, 

 with the average of the last fifteen years. 



1864 Experiment. 



The field in which this experiment was made stands at an 

 altitude of 90 feet. It is situated about six miles east from the 

 Frith of Clyde, and about one mile west from the town of Kil- 

 marnock. The soil is a dark brown clay loam, about twelve 

 inches deep ; the subsoil is yellow clay, with a few small boulders 

 in it. It is drained at about 22 inches deep, and 18 feet apart. 

 The course of cropping has been as follows : — 1861, oats, after 

 three years old pasture; 1862, wheat; 1863, green crop. In 

 anticipation of this experiment, the drills in 1863 were run 

 across the line of the ridges, so that all the plots used for 

 experiment would share alike in any difference of treatment, and 

 the manures applied both to the wheat in 1862, and to the green 

 crop in 1863, were the same throughout, A portion of the field 

 w T as divided into plots, four ridges in breadth, containing rather more 

 than an acre in each, and the most favourable " tid " in November 

 was taken advantage of for committing the seed to the ground. 



* It was found, on weighing the bags, when brought home from the field, 

 that, by a strange coincidence, almost the same quantity had been sown from 

 each. 



