EXPERIMENT STATION NOTES. 



California Station. — The investigation of the oil yield, etc., of the diflferent 

 olive varieties thus far grown in California is being continued with interesting 

 results, soon to be published. Analyses of different varieties of oranges are being made 

 and the work will be continued through the orange season. Eight varieties of olives 

 and 47 of wine grapes were received from Italy in February. Nearly all these varie- 

 ties are new to California and will be_ propagated for distribution at the central 

 station during the present season. Tests of 5 varieties of sugar-beets grown at the 

 foot-hill substation last season- and harvested the first week in February, show a 

 peculiar habit of growth, but a very satisfactory percentage of sugar, even on the 

 slopes of the Sierra Nevada Range, thus materially extending the possible area of 

 cultivation. 



Iowa Station. — C. F. Curtiss, B. S. A., has been elected assistant director; L. H. 

 Pammel, B. Agr., botanist ; and H. Osborn, M. S., entomologist. 



Kentucky College and Station. — The station building was burned February 

 23. The chemical laboratories of the station and college were completely destroyed, 

 together with the libraries and apparatus of the professors of agriculture and botany. 

 The station library and records were saved. The laboratory records of digestion 

 experiments and analysis of milk from six cows, from September last, were destroyed. 

 The loss to the station will reach $5,000 and to the college about |3,000. There was 

 no insurance on the apparatus, but the building was insured for $10,000. 



The grain louse {Siphonophora avena;) has been successfully followed through the 

 winter at this station. Specimens taken from corn blades and ears in midsummer 

 were transferred to growing wheat and kept undercover until the succeeding spring. 

 Other specimens secured later in the season on volurteer oats and wheat were also 

 kept under cover through the winter in young wheat on Id ue grass {Poa praiensis). 

 During all this time the confined aphides continued to reproduce ovo-viviparously. 

 The mild winter weather which prevailed in 1889-90, afforded .in opportunity to 

 follow the species out of doors all winter, and the observations indicate that the 

 species can and does sometimes reproduce throughout the winter without the pro- 

 duction of sexual individuals. 



Michigan Station. — Feeding experiments with steers have recently been com- 

 pleted and the results will soon be published in a bulletin. 



Minnesota Station. — In consequence of a fire which destroyed the office building 

 in October, 1890, and burned up bulletins Nos. 1-12 of the station, it will be imprac- 

 ticable for the station to furnish applicants with copies of bulletins earlier than No. 13. 



Missouri Station. — Owing to changes in the management of the station during 

 1889 no report for that year will be issued. 



New Mexico College and Station. — C. H. T. Townsend, of the Division of En- 

 tomology of the United States Department of Agriculture, has been elected professor 

 of entomology in the college and entomologist to the station. A. J. Wiechardt, M. E., 

 of the Iowa Agricultural College, has been elected i)rof'essor of mechanical eugi- 

 neering in the New Mexico Agricultural College. The college and station are now 

 occupying a building recently erected for their joint use. 

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