170 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



understood. In connection with seed-breeding work, methods have 

 been devised for testing, demonstrating, and determining carefully 

 the extent of the mixture that actually takes place in the ordinary 

 course of public ginning when a farmer gets a bale of cotton ginned 

 following a different variety. The results of such experiments show 

 that the most modern and mechanically improved gin plants are 

 mixing the seed on a scale even larger than before. A recent publi- 

 cation of the results of a series of experiments with modern gin 

 equipment shows an admixture in the first bale of about 26 per cent 

 from seed of previous customers held over in the gin machinery. 

 Even tlie second and third bales are contaminated, so that the aver- 

 age farmer has no prospect of keeping his seed pure if he patron- 

 izes a regular public gin and does not take the precaution of having 

 the machinery thoroughly cleaned, which is difficult and expensive. 



The only simple, practical, and really effective method of avoiding 

 the mixture of cotton seed at public gins is to organize the production 

 of the surrounding community so that only one variety of cotton is 

 brought to each gin. Where different varieties are planted in 

 neighboring fields and taken to the same gins it is out of the question 

 to keep the seed pure. Lack of pure seed is responsible for a general 

 failure to utilize superior varieties of cotton and for enormous indus- 

 trial and economic wastes through the production of inferior fiber 

 and the manufacture of weak, perishable fabrics. A system of one- 

 variety cotton gins is being developed in several communities in 

 Texas that are specializing in the production of superior varieties 

 and selling their seed as well as their cotton fiber at higher prices. 



Advantages of community cotton production. — Study of the pure- 

 seed problems leads inevitably to the recognition of community 

 production as a practical ideal of cotton improvement. Mixture 

 and degeniration of seed can be avoided if only one variety of cot- 

 ton is grown in each community or district. Keeping varietis pure 

 and developing adequate supplies of pure seed are community prob- 

 lems which individual farmers are practically helpless to solve for 

 Themselves under the usual conditions of production. Cooperation 

 to the extent of agreeing to plant the same variety of cotton is neces- 

 sary if farmers are to have regular supplies of pure seed for their 

 own use or to sell. The fiber also becomes more valuable, because 

 the precautions that are necessary to keep the seed pure are effective 

 at the same time in keeping the staple more uniform. Manufactur- 

 ers arc willing to pay more for uniform fiber, < specially if com- 

 mercial quantities are obtainable in the same district. Through 

 community a'ction it is possible to observe the necessary precautious, 

 so that superior varieties can be preserved, increased, and utilized. 

 This has been demonstrated in the striking progress made in rec nt 

 years in the Salt River Valley of Arizona, where the growers have 

 specialized in a single variety. 



Requirement of uniformity in cotton. — Mixtures of long and short 

 stai:)les are Avorse than useless to the manufacturers and can b- sold 

 by farmers only because, unskillful buyers often fail to detect even 

 badly mixed fil3er. It is much more difficult to detect the mixture 

 of different kinds of fiber in the bale than to recognize the different 

 kinds of plants in the field. By simple inspection of the fields it is 

 easy for those who are familiar with varieties to see whether the 



