206 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



Court House, Clearfield, Pa., 

 Tuesday Evening, 7.30, May 29, 1906. 



The meeting \i'as called to order at the designated hour by Hon. 

 Jason Sexton, of North Wales, Pa., Chairman for the evening ses- 

 sion. 



The CHAIR: It gives me great pleasure to introduce to you Prof. 

 J. W. T. Duvel, of the United States Department of Agriculture, 

 Washington, D. C, who will now address you on ''Good Seed, and 

 How to Obtain It: Adulterated Seed." 



Prof. Duvel delivered the following address: 



GOOD SEED AND HOW TO OBTAIN IT. 



By PBOF. J. W. T. DUVEL, United States Dept. of Agriculture, Washington, D. C. 



The question of the quality of the commercial seeds of our farm 

 crops, particularly of our forage plants, is one of the most important 

 with which our farmers haA'e to contend to-day. During the last 

 decade the quality of agricultural seeds which have been placed on 

 the market has grown gradually worse, and within the past six 

 months hundreds of thousands of pounds of worthless trash, screen- 

 ings or misbranded seed has been sold to our farmers and much of 

 it at fancy prices. The low quality of seed is particularly marked 

 in red clover, alfalfa, orchard grass and Kentucky bluegrass. But 

 inasmuch as the farmers of Pennsylvania are but little interested in 

 orchard grass or Kentucky bluegrass, I will discuss principally the 

 quality of commercial red clover and alfalfa seed. 



Every man who practices general farming knows that to omit 

 red clover or a closely related leguminous plant from his rotation, 

 almost invariably leads to a failure of crops. Yet, go into any sec- 

 tion of the country you please and farmers will tell you that they 

 can no longer grow red clover successfully in their fields. They 

 say their land is "clover-sick," needs lime or some other treatment, 

 they know not what. If the soil is known to be all right, the failures 

 are attributed to unfavorable weather at the time of sowing or per- 

 haps to a drouth later in the season. Undoubtedly any one of the 

 foregoing factors may result in the failure to get a stand of clover, 

 but an inspection of the quality of the seed which is being sold 

 will show that scores of failures can be traced directly to low grade 

 seed. In fact, to one who has examined the quality of commercial 

 seed, it is surprising to know that the failures are not much greater 

 than now reported. Seed of low vitality will not produce plants 

 which will thrive even under favorable conditions. While if the 

 seed is of strong vitality, the young plants will be healthy and full 

 of vigor; capable of producing good plants, unless the conditions 

 are extremely unfavorable. It is safe to say that good seed will al- 

 most invariably give a good stand when sown in sections adapted 

 to the production of red clover. 



Similarly we find innumerable failures in the growing of alfalfa, 

 the crop which promises to be of inestimable value to our farmers. 



