302 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



KEPORT OF MICROSCOPIST AND HYGIENIST 



By PROF. JAMES W. KELLOGG 



A report by your Microscopist and Hygienist to this body which 

 would impart information on subject suggested by the title given 

 your Specialist is called for and should be presented at this meeting. 

 Because of the fact that other specialists of the Board are to speak 

 on sanitation and allied subjects, and also because it has been im- 

 possible to devote special study to hygienic questions, it seems proper 

 that a report should be made to you, gentlemen, covering the work 

 of enforcing the new Seed Law in which we have been engaged dur- 

 ing the past year. Because of the newness of this work, it is felt 

 that a report showing what has been accomplished thus far would 

 be of special interest, rather than to devote time to a subject which 

 can be commented upon by others. 



Pennsylvania's first Pure Seed Law was placed on the statute 

 books as a result of the agitation on the part of members of the 

 State Board of Agriculture, seed growers and officials of the De- 

 partment of Agriculture, to improve the quality of seeds being sold 

 and grown throughout the State. At the 1913 session of the Legis- 

 lature, a bill was presented by Representative J. H. Wilson, which 

 was passed and approved by the Governor, April 21), 1913, which be- 

 came effective as a law, January 1, of the following year. The Sec- 

 retary of Agriculture was charged with the enforcement of the law 

 and the laboratory of the Department was accordingly called upon 

 to perform the necessary duties under its provisions. Proper equip- 

 ment was installed in the laboratory and the service of a competent 

 expert employed to make tests for purity on the samples which were 

 collected by special agents or which were sent in by residents of 

 the State. 



The Seed Law establishes standards of purity for 21 kinds of 

 seeds and prohibits the presence in the same of dodder and Canada 

 thistle in excess of one seed in 3,000. It imposes a penalty for sell- 

 ing any of the seeds stated in the law, which do not meet the stand- 

 ards of purity, provides for the collection and examination of sam- 

 ples and for the testing of special samples of seeds sent to the De- 

 partment, making a charge for such tests of 25 cents each. These 

 standards of purity range from 75% to 97% as follows: 



Medium red clover, Trifolium pratense, ....•• 97% 



Mammoth red clover, . . . .Trifolium pratense, ....•• 97% 



Crimson clover, Trifolium incarnatum, 97% 



Alfalfa, Medicago sativa, 97% 



Timothy grass, Phleum pratense, 97% 



Barley, Hordeum vulgare, 97% 



Spelt, Triticum aestivum Spelta, 97% 



Wheat, Triticum aestivum, 97% 



Buckwheat, Fagopyrum Fagopyrum, 97% 



Oats, Avena sativai, 97% 



