602 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



The establishment of such a journal is regarded as a distinct step 

 in advance. There has always been confusion in the public mind 

 from indiscriminate mixing of popular and technical work in the 

 bulletins. The practice has had the effect of detracting from a just 

 appreciation of these publications by both the farmer and the man 

 of science, in about equal degree. The former and the public in 

 general have felt that unless the matter in the bulletins could be 

 fully understood, the work was impractical and the reading unprofit- 

 able. Men of science, on the other hand, while they have recognized 

 these publications as containing much of interest to science, have 

 complained of the material being enveloped in so much that was of 

 no interest to them, and of the scattered and fugitive form in which 

 it was issued. Hence a classification of the published matter is to 

 the distinct advantage of all classes of readers, makes the popular 

 or practical and the research publications more effective, and pre- 

 vents misunderstanding and confusion. 



The publication of the research work of the experiment stations 

 was a matter of considerable concern when the amount of research 

 began to materially increase under the stimulus of the Adams Act. 

 There were movements for a journal or common organ, growing out 

 of the recognized advantages of such an organ and the large ex- 

 pense of separate publication, but nothing came of these efforts un- 

 til recently. Meanwhile, the provision of a series of research bulle- 

 tins by a considerable number of the stations has relieved the situa- 

 tion, but is not felt to have fully solved it. These bulletins result 

 in a segregation which was greatly needed, but they do not overcome 

 the objection to fragmentary publication. The plan has relieved 

 the farmer from the anno3'^ance of getting papers of purely the- 

 oretical and technical interest, but it has not fully enabled the scien- 

 tific world to keep track of what is being done or to find it after a 

 few years. 



The same arguments in favor of a central or common agency for 

 the publication of agricultural investigation apply now that pre- 

 vailed a few years ago, and probably with equal or greater force. 

 For the stations which have made no attempt at its separate publi- 

 cation such an organ is increasingly important, and for those which 

 have established research series, it adds the advantage of wide cir- 

 culation, preservation, and adequate indexing of their reports of 

 investigation. 



Two main objects are sought in publishing the reports of re- 

 search — reaching a wide audience of persons interested in the work 

 in question, and recording it where it can be permanently found. 

 Promptness is usually a desirable factor, and the author is naturally 



