4-5 EDWARD VII. SESSIONAL PAPER No. 16 A. 1905 



REPORT OF THE EXPERIMENTALIST. 



(CiiAS. E. Saunders, B.A., Ph.D.) 



Dr. Wat. Salxders, 



Director Dominion Experimental Farms, 

 Ottawa. 



Sir, — I have the honour to submit herewith, the second annual report of the 

 Division of Cereal Breeding and Experimentation. 



The cross-fertilising and the selecting of desirable types among cereals occupied 

 much time during the early summer; and, the comparative study of the different 

 •varieties of cereals, field roots, &c., as they reached maturity, was the chief work of the 

 later part of the season. 



Some attention was also given, during your absence on your annual visit to the 

 branch farms, to the new varieties of hardy, hybrid crab-apples which are being 

 produced for the northern parts of the Dominion. 



Good progress has been made during the year in the enlargement of the museumj 

 collection of cereals, which is proving of great value. 



In the month of December, 1903, I attended the first meeting of the American 

 Breeders' Association at St. Louis, where I presented a paper entitled: 'Some Obser- 

 •\atioiLS on Heredity in Wheat.' 



On the same trip, visits were paid to some of the wheat-testing laboratories in 

 Chicago, Minneapolis and Brookings (South Dakota). Much kindness was received 

 from Prof. Tas. H. Shepard of the South Dakota Experiment Station, who explained 

 in detail the methods used by him in his studied on the milling qualities of the 

 macaroni wheats. 



During the winter, much time was spent in the careful study of a large numbev 

 of selected heads of wheat and other grains for the purpose of starting improved 

 strains of some of the most important varieties. Hand selection of threshed grain 

 from the plots of some of the best sorts of wheat, in order to eliminate certain un- 

 desirable types of seed, has also been carried on; while the whole of the grain for th? 

 experimental plots was, as usual, carefully hand picked before being sown. 



The purchase of a roller-process flour mill for the grinding of small quantities 

 of wheat has enabled me to comuijence an investigation into the quality of Canadian 

 wheats. 



I am much indepted to Mr. George Fixter, for his valuable work as foreman in 

 eliarge of the experimental plots, and to Miss M. Hager, for the great care with which 

 >he performed the work of seed selection in the difficult cases which were entrusted 

 to her. 



I am indebted also to Profecsor C. A. Zavitz, of Guelph, for so-^d of a strain o: 

 Early Yellow Soja beans, to Professor J. H. Shepard of Brookings, for an excellent 

 sample of macaroni m.adc at the South Dakota Ex-periment Station, to the Sheffield- 

 King Milling Conupany of Faribault, Minn., for a large sample of patent flour made 

 from macaroni wheat (which proved very good for bread making), to the Lalce of the 

 Woods Milling Company and to the Ogilvie Flour Mills Company for fine samples 

 of the products of their mills, to the L^nited States Department of Agriculture for some 

 new varieties of barley, to Mr. C. Boije of Finland, for new sorts of oats, and to Mr. 



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