148 ANNUAL REPORTS OP DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



Kansas-grown and Dakota-grown alfalfas; yellow and white sweet 

 clover; Brabham, Groit, and Early Buff varieties of cowpeas; fet- 

 erita; Kaiser, Bangalia, Carleton, French June, Golden Vine, and 

 Chang varieties of j&eld peas ; Natal grass and Rhodes grass ; Dwarf 

 hegari; Dwarf Blackhull kafir; Kursk millet; white milo; Red 

 Amber, Orange, Honey, and Freed sorghums ; Black Eyebrow, Hab- 

 erlandt. Mammoth Yellow, Manchu, Tokio, Early Green, Ebony, 

 Hollybrook, Ito San, Peking, Virginia, and Wilson cowpeas; five 

 varieties of soy beans ; Sudan grass ; Georgia and Yokohama varieties 

 of velvet beans; Acala, Columbia, Dixie, Durango, Holden, Lone 

 Star, and Trice varieties of cotton. 



During the year 244,463 packages of new and rare field seeds were 

 distributed, including 90,067 packages of cotton seed. The results 

 obtained were gratifying and indicated the value of a distribution 

 of this kind. Such a distribution enables a farmer to secure seed of 

 new and improved crops in sufficient quantities to produce stocks for 

 future seeding, the general effect of which is gradually to improve 

 the crops of the country. 



FLOOD-RELIEF SEED DISTRIBUTION. 



On August 3, 1916, Public Resolution No. 28, Sixty-fourth Con- 

 gress (S. J. Res. 160) was approved, appropriating $540,000 for the 

 relief of flood sufferers in the States of North Carolina, South Caro- 

 lina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Tennessee, and Mississippi, out of 

 which appropriation $80,000 was set aside by the War Department 

 for use by the Department of Agriculture in purchasing and dis- 

 tributing seeds to provide food for the population and feed for the 

 animals of the flood areas. Through cooperation with the Office of 

 Extension Work in the South of the States Relations Service, the 

 State and district leaders and county agents furnished information 

 regarding the number of destitute families in the flood areas needing 

 seed and handled the direct distribution of the seed furnished by 

 the Department. 



During the autumn of 1916, 1,035,514 pounds of field seeds and 

 24,934 pounds of vegetable seeds were distributed, the field seeds in- 

 cluding buckwheat, cowpeas, Italian rye-grass, millet, oats, pasture- 

 grass mixture, rape, sorghums, soy beans, and Sudan grass, and the 

 vegetable seeds including turnip, kale, spinach, beet, and collards. 



During the spring of 1917, 5,150 bushels of corn, 3,550 bushels of 

 soy beans, 1,700 bushels of cowpeas, 2,525 bushels of velvet beans, and 

 5,000 collections of vegetable seed's were distributed to destitute farm- 

 ers in the flood areas. Approximately 21,000 destitute families were 

 reached by the flood-relief seed distribution, and the numerous re- 

 ports of the Department's agents show that the distribution of this 

 seed to the destitute farmers in the flood areas was timely and 

 effective. 



VELVET BEANS. 



The increased culture of the velvet bean in the South during the 

 past two years has been one of the most remarkable recent develop- 

 ments in our agriculture. Heretofore the culture of the velvet bean 

 has been largely limited to Florida; but with the introduction by 

 the Department of several early varieties (particularly the Chinese) 



