30 MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS. 



THE IMPORTATION OF LOW-GRADE SEED SHOULD BE STOPPED. 



Every pound of worthless seed imported is finally sold to the 

 farmer. Some of it goes into the trade to fill the demand for cheap 

 seed. More of it is used to mix with better seed in the grading-down 

 process. By mixing 100 pounds of seed worth $15 with 100 pounds 

 of imported screenings which cost $7.50, a medium grade will result, 

 costing $11.25 per hundred pounds, which is not sold at $11.25 but 

 at $13 or $14 per hundred pounds. Whenever a dealer mixes two 

 qualities of seed together to make a medium or low grade the price 

 is not reduced in proportion to the quality. In this way the jobber or 

 dealer who mixes seeds invariably gets a profit on the screenings 

 which are used. 



Unfortunately many farmers in the United States furnish a ready 

 market for the refuse from our own cleaning mills, and moreover, on 

 account of their demand for cheap seed, we are importing the waste 

 from other countries. Seedsmen should not, perhaps, be altogether 

 blamed for meeting this demand for cheap seed, and they must be 

 expected to sell it as long as there is a call for it. At the same time, 

 the farmer not being as good a judge as the seedsman often takes 

 what is offered at the lowest price and unwittingly pays more for 

 the. seed that will grow than if he had bought the best. What is of 

 more importance to the farmer, however, is not that he is paying 

 more for his seed than he should, but that in buying low-grade 

 seed he gets either a poor stand from sowing dead seed, or small, weak 

 plants from sowing seed of low vigor, or the crop is smothered. by 

 weeds wliich will continue to foul the land for many years. 



Argentina has a law prohibiting the importation of alfalfa and 

 clover seed containing the seed of dodder. Canada proliibits the 

 sale within her borders of seed containing weed seeds, but provides 

 for its export. Europe is effectually protected from the use of 

 poor seeds through its seed-control stations, but its screenings are 

 exported. It seems time that the United States had some restriction 

 on the importation of seeds of such poor quahty that they can not 

 be sold in other countries. 

 Ill— III 



