16 



In this district, because of the rich, black soil and dr}-, hot suminoi's, 

 there is grown the highest grade of spring wheat in the world, except- 

 ing the spring varieties of the middle Volga region in Russia, which 

 are very siniihir. 



Two general types of wheat prevail throughout this district — the 

 Velvet Blue Stem' and the Fife. A large proportion of the farmers 

 in this region know no wheat which does not belong to one of these 

 types. The chaff of the Velvet Blue Stem is covered rather closely 

 with small hairs, and the plants are bluish gray near harvest time. 

 In both types the heads are beardless and the grains are medium or 

 small, hard, and red. There are several strains or varieties of each 

 type. The gluten content of these wheats is comparatively very large, 

 and especially of that quality which gives great lightness in bread 

 making. 



The average annual wheat production of this district is larger than 

 that of any other siuiilar area in the WT)rld, and is about 30 per cent of 

 the entire production of the United States, The average yield per 

 acre, however, is not very large — certainly far below what it might be. 

 Almost everywhere the self-I)inder is used in harvesting the grain, and 

 in some localities the farms given entirelv to wheat culture cover many 

 thousand acres. (See Plate II.) On these bonanza farms 50 to 100 

 self -binding liarvesters are sometimes at work at the same time. The 

 large size of the farms is one of the worst features connected with 

 wheat growing in the Northwest. From this cause not enough atten- 

 tion is given to details of the work. Operations delegated to the best 

 of foremen and other emplo3^ees are never so carefull}' performed as 

 when done under the direct scrutiny of the man who owns the farm, 

 and wliose interests are therefore at stake. Little things that are of 

 importance when summed up are overlooked. The tillage is not thor- 

 oughl}^ accomplished, weeds are not kept down, there is more or less 

 waste of land, and the grain is allowed to degenerate in quality. 



The needs of the grower in this district are not so great as in some 

 others, though there is much to l)e desired. In the northern portion 

 earliness of maturity is needed to enable the wheat to escape the early 

 autumn frosts which sometimes catch the crop before harvest, while 

 in the southern portion chinch-bug depredations and rust attacks might 

 often be avoided through possession of the same quality. A combina- 

 tion of earliness and rust resistance in the same variety would be espe- 

 cially desirable. The average yield could be made ver}^ much larger, as 

 already stated, but this is a matter depending fully as much on methods 

 of culture as on the improvement of varieties. Proper seed selection, 



' There are apparently four distinct varieties of so-called Blue Stem in the United 

 States. The name Velvet Blue Stem is adopted here to designate the spruig variety 

 grown in this district. The one grown in the Palouse country will 1)e called Palouse 

 Blue Stem. 



