828 EXPEKIMENT STATION RECORD. 



and biology of agricultural plants and forest growths, the chemistry and physics of 

 the soil, meteorology, and injurious diseases and insects. Both original articles and 

 abstracts will be pulilished, together with notes and personal items. 



The Royal Bavarian Agricultural-Botanical Institute, which was opened at Munich 

 last October, with Dr. L. Hiltner as director, has Ijegun the publication of an organ 

 known as Fraktische Blatter fur Pflanzenhau und Pfanzensclivtz. Judging from the 

 announcement and the first number, it is to be a sort of popular bulletin, issued 

 monthly and confined to brief accounts of matters of direct interest to the practical 

 farmer. As the popular organ of a German scientific institution and edited by the 

 director, it is of interest as marking a rather unusual departure. 



Miscellaneous. — A note in Scieyice states that the Government of Nicaragua will 

 send 15 students annually to colleges of agriculture in the Southern States. 



An experiment farm of 50 acres near Comanche, Tex. , is reported to have been 

 established by the "Frisco System," with the object of assisting the farmers of the 

 region in raising hogs, interest in which has l)een increased b}' the establishment 

 of a packing house at Fort Worth. 



As previously announced (p. 532) the Carnegie Institution has made a grant of 

 $8,000 for the establishment and maintenance of a desert botanical laboratory. Act- 

 ing on the recommendation of the committee appointed to look after the location and 

 management of the laboratory, F. V. Coville and D. T. MacDougal, the regents have 

 decided to locate the laboratory on a tract of about 50 acres of land near Tucson, 

 Ariz. A laboratory building will be erected there at an early date. 



The Sharon Biological Observatory, a summer school for teachers at Sharon, Mass., 

 will, according to Science, experiment in forestry on a tract of 300 acres of woodland 

 which it purposes making into a model forest. Applications have been made to the 

 Bureau of Forestry for a working plan. 



G. M. Odium, a graduate of the Michigan Agricultural College in 1900, now farm 

 manager of the Methodist Episcopal Estate, Umtali, Rhodesia, is in this country to 

 study the farm machinery in use on large ranches in our "Western States, with a view 

 of purchasing and exporting suitable steam-power plows and other implements for 

 use on the estate in his charge. This estate contains about 13,000 acres, and, while 

 not officially connected with the agricultural department of Rhodesia, a small area 

 is being used by Mr. Odium for demonstration experiments with cereals, legumes, 

 forest trees, and in irrigation, under the auspices of that department. 



The department of agriculture of Rhodesia, located at Salisbury, has until this 

 year been a division of the surveyor-general's department, but is now an independ- 

 ent organization consisting of the secretary of agriculture, E. Ross Townsend, an 

 agriculturist, a register of brands, a staff of clerks, and the veterinary service, which 

 includes a chief vetermary surgeon and five assistant surgeons. The department 

 cooperates with farmers in experiments with cotton and tobacco, maintains a free 

 veterinary service, and publishes bulletins for distribution among the farmers. Mr. 

 Odium will spend considerable time studying the work of the U. S. Department of 

 Agriculture, more especially with reference to the tobacco investigations, for the pur- 

 pose of making a comprehensive report to the department of agriculture of Rhodesia. 



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