48 Department ^r- Plant-Breeding. 



It is too early to make any predictions regarding this line of investiga* 

 tion, but results so far certainly justify its continuance. The winter 

 oats ripened about two weeks earlier than spring oats and are much 

 freer from smut and rust. 



Wheat breeding experiments. — The wheat breeding experiments have 

 been continued in much the same manner as outlined in the last report 

 of this department, with the exception that there are not so many different 

 varieties being grown. More selections of individual plants of some of 

 the more standard varieties have been tested out to a greater extent. 

 Several hundred individual plants from about a dozen standard varieties 

 have been tested out in rod rows in order to get some comparison of 

 yields between varieties and also between the different strains within 

 the variety. 



These experiments have not been continued long enough to enable us to 

 draw any conclusions. However, they have progressed far enough to 

 show that there are certain strains from the different varieties which 

 yield much more than other strains of the same variety. With this in 

 mind it seems possible to select high-yielding strains from the common 

 varieties grown in New York. In order to determine which strains will 

 be the highest yielders much careful testing must be done. 



Potato breeding experiments. — The potato breeding experiments 

 which were outlined in our last report have been continued in much the 

 same manner. The greater part of this work, however, is primarily of 

 a scientific nature to determine the extent of bud variation. However, 

 part of the data will be valuable with respect to the testing of certain 

 methods of potato selection. 



A large number of potato seedlings have been grown with the hope 

 of obtaining improved races and at the same time further information 

 in regard to variation in potato seeding. The data on this experiment 

 have been taken in such a manner that the results for one year may be 

 carefully compared with those of another, to determine whether the best 

 races can be selected at the end of the first or second year of the growth 

 of the seedlings, and thus do away with testing the seedlings for several 

 years. 



Another, experiment has been begun which is to test in a practical way 

 the four-hill unit system of potato breeding which has been suggested 

 by this department, but it is too early to draw any conclusions from 

 this experiment. 



Forage crop investigations. — A number of miscellaneous experiments 

 are being made with forage crops other than timothy, but these experi- 

 ments are being conducted on a comparatively small scale. They include : 



