REPORT OF ASSISTANT DAIRY INSTRUCTOR. 25 



There have been many growers who have quite a seed trade 

 who have never made any systematic effort to improve their 

 own seed stock. Had the same care been taken by the potato 

 growers to grow thoroughbred potatoes, as has been taken by 

 our dairy interests, horse and swine breeders, the seed trade of 

 the state would have been worth many hundreds of thousands 

 of dollars more than is the case at present. 



I recall one case in which one man who had quite a seed 

 trade south, who last spring bought, at ten cents per barrel, 

 several scores of barrels of potatoes for his own planting, from 

 his neighbors who were hauling them past his place to a starch 

 factory. He could, have no surety that these were not mixed 

 and, indeed. Such was the case. Many acres planted from this 

 seed were entered for inspection and certification, but were dis- 

 qualified for varietal mixture and disease. It is my firm belief 

 that had this man taken pains with his seed in the past his 

 crop this year would have averaged at least $50 or more per 

 acre. On a Cobbler field, belonging to the above party, I saw 

 some of the strongest, stockiest hills of Irish Cobblers that I 

 noted in the wliole state, and could this man have been per- 

 suaded to mark what he and one man could have marked in a 

 day's time, digging these marked hills by hand at digging time, 

 he would have had a lot for his own seed that would have been 

 true to name and free of disease and that would have given 

 him, in my opinion, a third greater yield than anything he will 

 have to plant the coming summer. 



This matter of varietal mixture has been as great a source of 

 annoyance and loss to those in the south, who have bought 

 Maine seed, as has diseased stock Varietal mixtures are very 

 easily done away with by hill selection in the field. A single 

 year's work, especially with some varieties, will suffice not only 

 to make them true to name, but give the grower a much greater 

 yield per acre. I have seen many fields this year that I feel 

 sure would have yielded their owners double the crop obtained, 

 if hill selection had been practiced for the grower's own seed. 



The Irish Cobbler which, without doubt, is the one most in 

 demand for seed south, can be gotten true to name by another 

 method besides hill selection in the field — that is, by sunning the 

 tubers before planting. There is in the case of the Cobbler a 

 pigment in the skin of the tuber which will turn purple, upon 



