DAIRY AND SEED IMPROVEMENT MEETINGS. 235 



the ear. Large cob and shank should be avoided in the seed 

 corn. 



A great deal depends upon the care of the seed corn, after 

 harvesting. It should be harvested early enough to avoid 

 freezing in the field, and then carefully preserved in a place 

 where the temperature is not low enough for freezing — not 

 lower than fifty degrees — and where it can be so placed as to 

 receive a free ventilation. The method of tracing it up by 

 weaving the ears with a twine string, and hanging up the lots 

 in such a way thaft the air can get to them to dry tliem out thor- 

 oughly is preferred over the ordinary way of hanging up the 

 ears in traces. The heavy coarse cob and the large shank that 

 goes with it cannot be detected so well while the husks are on a?* 

 they may be when stripped of husks. This, condition is not 

 noticed until the corn is shelled for planting. The coarse cob is 

 an indication of low shelling percentage. The ear with the big 

 cob at the butt is usually shown either by an extra row of com, 

 running an inch or more down from the base, or by a very open 

 conformation of the ear indicated by wide spaces between the 

 rows. As the yield of com is the objective point and the cob 

 is altogether waste, the greater proportion of corn to cob that 

 we secure, the more profit there is in this enterprise. Seed 

 grown in the same locality and under similar environments 

 should be used if at all possible. 



TESTING. 



The corn, previous to shelling, should be tested ear by ear, 

 for germinating qualities. This may be done by selecting six 

 grains from various parts of the ear, testing them by one of the 

 ordinary methods of seed testing and using only the ears that 

 give a very high percentage of germinating power. This will 

 guarantee a better stand and as the stand is one of the factors 

 goveming each yield, it is a very important factor. 



SHELLING THE CORN FOR PLANTING. 



Of course this should be done by hand as injury to the seed 

 will not occur as it would if the corn were shelled by machinery. 

 The coarser grains at the butt and the smaller grains at the tip 

 should be discarded. First, because if it is planted by a ma- 



