214 



KAXSAS. 



Kansas Agricultural Experiment Station. 



Dcpiniiiiciit of Kansas state Afirivultiira] ('(jUegr. 

 Location, Manhattan. Director, E. M. Sheltoii. M. S. 



BULLETIN No. 7. -JULY. ISSO 



Experiments with avheat, E. ^I. Shelton, M. S. (pp. 77-87).— 

 The description of these is prefaced by a brief argument in favor of 

 wheat raising- in the State, in which it is urged that " Avheat raising 

 upon a htrge scale and carried on as a specialty deserves condemna- 

 tion in Kansas as elsewhere: l>ut when the crop is grown as part of 

 a system in alternation with corn, oats, grass, and other crops, it is 

 almost certainly a profitable one to the farmer." On the College 

 farm the average yield for sixteen years, including three total fail- 

 ures, has been 18J bushels per acre, and the average selling price 80 

 cents per bushel. The acreage of this staple, however, has been sub- 

 ject to wide fluctuations, and since the short crops of 1885, 1886, and 

 1887, vrheat in many counties of the State has ceased to be promi- 

 nent as an agricultural product. To the objection that wheat fur- 

 nishes shelter and support to chinch-bugs early in the season, enabling 

 them to pass directly fi'om the wheat to the adjoining fields of corn 

 and oats, it is replied that this danger has been greatly overestimated ; 

 that in sixteen years no corn crop has Iseen lost on the College farm 

 from tlie action of the chinch-bugs, and that Avhen damage has been 

 done " the action of these insects has always been to emphasize the 

 effects of drought.-' 



Pasturing wheat (pp. 78, 79). — An experiment inidertaken the pre- 

 vious year was repeated in 1889 to determine what effect close pastur- 

 ing by cattle would have on growing wheat. Xo result of value lias 

 thus far been reached. 



Experiments icith rar/etiex (})p. 79-81). — Nineteen varieties of 

 wheat were grown on small ])lats. The results, recorded in a table, 

 were deemed of little value except as forming those of one experiment 

 in a series necessary to afford an approximation to the truth. For 

 many years the main crop of the College farm has been either the 

 Red IMay or Zinnnerman variety. Both, however, together wiih the 

 Little May and Big May, are l)elieved to be one and the same variety, 

 a wheat stooling enormously under favorable conditions, ripening 

 early, yielding heavily, having excellent flouring qualities, and show- 

 ing marked endurance of hot, dry weather, but somewhat susceptible 

 to winter-killing. From observations at the Station it is concluded 

 that wheats really successful in Kansas are the reds, soft or hard. 



Fertilizers and methods of ctdti cation (pp. 81-86). — Fort3^-five 

 one-twentieth-acre plats were laid off side by side on a strong clay 

 loam of ordinary fertility, manured and cultiA^ated plats alternating 

 with those receiving no fertilizers or unusual cultivation. Six plats 



