560 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



The Porto Rico station has demonstrated the practicability of 

 controlling cattle ticks through the use of dipping tanks, and there 

 are now more than 100 public and private tanks in the island. Fol- 

 lowing the control of ticks and with the introduction of improved 

 forage plants, the livestock industry has developed rapidly, and 

 dairying has become an actuality. The station led in the investi- 

 gations which made these developments possible. The station has 

 assisted very materially in the development of the citrus industry of 

 the island, established vanilla growing as a profitable undertaking. 

 and introduced Uba sugar cane, which is resistant to the mosaic 

 disease and is now extensively planted. 



In Guam the demonstration of modern methods of agriculture 

 and the introduction of improved varieties of crops and purebred 

 livestock by the station have greatly improved the agricultural 

 situation of the island, and stock raising, as an industry, has become 

 established. As a result of the station's investigations it is now 

 possible for the people of Guam to produce a better quality and a 

 larger quantity of copra, for which an enhanced price is obtained. 



Sugar-cane breeding has been an outstanding feature of the work 

 of the Virgin Islands station, and a variety has been developed 

 that not only outyields any of the varieties that are grown locally, 

 but has proved its high value when tested in several other countries. 



THE NUTRITION INVESTIGATIONS. 



As the work of the Office of Experiment Stations in its relations 

 with the State experiment stations touched lines of work for which 

 the Department of Agriculture had at the time no organization, 

 there was for a number of years a growing tendency to put under 

 that office special investigations for which Congress provided funds. 

 The first of such investigations to come to this office was that which 

 dealt with human nutrition. 



This work grew out of the studies which were being made at 

 Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn., in conjunction with the 

 Storrs Experiment Station. The results of these studies had at- 

 tracted the attention of Hon. Edward Atkinson, of Boston, Mass., 

 who had compiled data on this subject from foreign sources and 

 had been interested in the experimental and practical work of the 

 New England Kitchen, in that city, conducted by Mrs. Ellen H. 

 Richards, with the collaboration of the Massachusetts Institute of 

 Technology. Mr. Atkinson prepared a paper containing "Sug- 

 gestions for the establishment of food laboratories in connection 

 with the agricultural experiment stations," which was published as 

 Bulletin 17 of the Office of Experiment Stations. Secretary Morton 

 became interested in this matter and asked Congress for an appro- 

 priation for nutrition investigations, which was granted for the 

 fiscal year 1894. 



The supervision of this work was assigned to the Office of Experi- 

 ment Stations and Professor Atwatcr was put in charge, with head- 

 quarters at Middletown. For a number of years the work was car- 

 ried on in cooperation with Wesleyan University and Storrs Experi- 

 m nt Station in Connecticut and with coll ges, experiment stations, 

 and other institutions in many States. It consisted of the collection 

 of information rejrardiner the foods available and their uses in dif- 



