Report of the Director. 25 



I consider that a thorough-going inquiry of this kind gradually 

 extended to all parts of New York State is of the very g-reatest 

 importance. It would give to the State first-hand data gathered by 

 experts as to the actual condition of our agricultural industries, and 

 would be the foundation for the making of careful studies as to how 

 our agriculture can best be adapted to its local conditions. This 

 inquiry should be followed up or correlated with a study of the 

 social and economic condition to the end that the whole status may 

 be thoroughly understood. A survey of this kind would require 

 the expenditure each year of a few thousand dollars ; and it should 

 be spent only as rapidly as thoroughly trained men can be found to 

 undertake the w^ork, and as the results can be carefully studied 

 and digested. 



The Experiment Station. 



With the pressure of teaching and administration, the work of 

 the man who is engaged in experiment or research is likely to be 

 very much broken. Fruitful research requires that a man be able 

 to give the subject his major attention consecutively for a sufficient 

 period of time to carry the work to a finish. In order that there 

 may be the least possible interference with such work, the funds 

 received from the Federal government under the Hatch Act and the 

 Adams Act have been set aside for the maintenance of research 

 work. The temptation to start many lines of work and to employ 

 many men has hindered rather than encouraged investigation. It 

 is therefore conceived that it is better to maintain two or three de- 

 partments from the Federal funds, and to maintain each one 

 strongly, than to establish many enterprises no one of which could 

 have sufficient funds to enable it to develop its best results. Leav- 

 ing aside for the time being live-stock interest (certain phases of 

 which are already handled by the Veterinary College), it is con- 

 ceived that the remaining biological and chemical problems of agri- 

 culture associate themselves about two points, namely, the soil and 

 the plant. We have, therefore, organized on the Federal funds a 

 department of soil inquiry with Dr. Lyon at its head, and a depart- 

 ment of plant biology (which will be largely given to plant-breed- 

 ing) in charge of Dr. Webber. The only other department that 

 receives any maintenance from the Federal fund is the entomologi- 

 cal work in which one man is supported from these sources. The 

 men who are employed on the Federal funds expected to give all 

 their time to research. They teach no undergraduate students, but 

 they may take a limited number of post-graduates, who will become 

 practically assistants in the investigational work. For the work of 



