154 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



be piled on top of each other. These can be transferred into the 

 cellar and piled up in a comparatively compact space, and yet the 

 crates will allow a free circulation of air, which is desirable. This 

 method of storage furthermore, allows the grower to examine the 

 seed occasionally during the winter and take out any tubers which 

 may have started to rot before they have had opportunity to affect 

 any of the adjoining tubers. Every precaution possible should be 

 taken to keep the tubers cold, and therefore free from sprouting 

 until about two weeks before planting time. It is of the highest 

 importance that the tubers should not be allowed to sprout in the 

 darkness previous to planting, and if the cellar becomes too warm 

 in the early spring, as is liable to be the case, to hold the seed 

 tubers dormant, they should either be put in cold storage, if such 

 means is "available, or they may be stored in pits in the fields, and 

 by proper management kept dormant until it is time to expose 

 them before planting. - 



It is probably not generally understood that it is important to 

 expose the tubers to light a short time before planting. They 

 should be taken out of the cold storage or cellar from ten days to 

 two weeks before it is intended to plant them, and exposed to the 

 light in some fairly dry warm place. Several experiments which 

 have been carried out at the Cornell Station indicate the effect 

 which may be expected from such exposure of seed. 



Professor Gilmore in 1903 carried out an experiment with 

 Maine-grown stock of the Sir Walter Raleigh variety, which was 

 rather interesting. About May 5, this stock, which had been 

 kept in excellent condition, was separated into two lots. One part 

 was simply stored in a cool place in the barn and the other part put 

 into cold storage, until July 6, when both parts were planted. The 

 barn stored seed was considerably wilted ; sprouts from two to six 

 inches long had formed, which were most broken off in the course 

 of planting. The cold storage seed was just beginning to sprout 

 into growth. The yields of these two lots of seed from equal areas 

 were as follows: Barn stored seed, wilted and sprouted, 42.5 

 pounds. Cold storage seed, solid, slightly sprouted, 111.0 pounds. 



These figures show a gain of 159 per cent in favor of the solid 

 nearly dormant seed. 



Another experiment carried on in 1904 by Mr. S. Fraser of 

 the Cornell Station, is also interesting in this connection. The seed 

 tubers were stored from November to May in crates in a cool 

 cellar. No sprouts had started May first. They were then di- 

 vided into four lots, one of which was put into a dark cellar, fifty 



