EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 



187 



farmers who will keej) the seed pure and sell seed to their neighbors. 

 Through these co-operators the general farmer may expect finally to re- 

 ceive benefit from these pedigreed high producing wheats. 



Thus the Experiment Station takes the ordinary commercial mixtures 

 (called varieties) and if after some ])reliminary testing they are con- 

 sidered promising they are separated into several pure strains, each 

 descending from single plants, and these are tested separately in the 

 variety series. A variety that goes out to the farmer is not an original 

 variety but the highest yielding pure strain found in one of them. 



However, the yielding quality is not the only thing to be considered. 

 The miller demands good milling wheats and the baker has a right to 

 have good flour from which to make his bread. Thus a variety cannot be 

 recommended simply because it is a high yieldcr but it must also be a 



I 



Fig. 2. — Series of 1/100 acre wheat plots in foreground, and 1/20 acre oat series in background. 

 Mostly from individual plants of 1906. Crop of 1909. 



good bread making wheat. The Experiment Station is now making 

 milling and baking tests on the higher yielding wheats. 



Penally the farmer must study the adaptability of new wheats to his 

 conditions. As a rule the farmer should avoid sending off great dis- 

 tances for seed wheat unless it be for experimental purposes. The Ex- 

 periment Stations generally find that varieties from other countries must 

 be grown for two or three years in their new home before the yield can 

 be relied upon. Even grain that comes from other states changes both 

 in quality and yield and it is ])robable that grain changed from one kind 

 of soil to another in the same neighborhood does not do as well the first 

 year after the change as it would have done under its home conditions. 

 The farmer who has been awake to his possibilities in obtaining the best 

 variety for his farm and Avho has selected that seed carefully on his own 

 soil has undoubtedly a much better variety for his own conditions than 

 can ordinarily be obtained outside, A few years ago the Minnesota and 



