FIELD CROPS. 233 



"At all stations where it has been tried, listing for oats has been either more 

 profitable or has resulted in less loss than fall plowing. Green manuring has 

 been productive of higher yields than either fall or spring plowing, or disliing 

 corn ground, at nine of the thirteen stations from which results by it are re- 

 ported. The cost of production by this method was so high that it showed a 

 profit at only two stations. Oats following summer tillage produced the highest 

 average yields at all stations except Hettinger, where the yield w\as exceeded 

 only by that on disked corn ground. While the expense of the method has pre- 

 vented its being the most profitable, the degree of insurance which it affords 

 against failure of the feed crop might justify its practice in oat pi'oduction in 

 at least some sections of the Great Plains. Dislving corn ground yielded the 

 highest profits of any method tested at all stations except Garden City and 

 Dalhart. At these two stations the crop was produced at a loss, but this loss 

 was less than by any other method." 



Potato breeding and selection, W. Stuaet (U. 8. Dept. Agr. Bui. 195 {1915), 

 pp. 35, pis. 16, figs. 2). — In this bulletin the author defines breeding and selection 

 and their limitations in work with the potato, notes the technique in handling 

 the pistil and stamens, discusses pollen-producing varieties, and gives results of 

 experimental crosses since 1909. 



It is noted as doubtful whether the secretion of a stigmatic fluid is a normal 

 function of the potato blossom at the present time. This observation is stated 

 as being contrary to the teachings of previous investigators. Records show the 

 parentage, number of flowers crossed, number of seed balls developed, percent- 

 age of success, and the number of seedlings that produced tubers for over 100 

 crosses made in 1909. Varietal affinity is noted as a factor in making success- 

 ful crosses. The method of growing and testing some 28,000 seedlings is de- 

 scribed. 



In regard to inheritance in the Fi generation it is stated that " in a popula- 

 tion of 1,425 seedlings from a cross between Irish Cobbler and Irish Seedling, 

 the first parent having a creamy white skin and purplish tinged sprouts and 

 the latter with flesh-tinted skin and purplish sprouts, color was absent in 70.2 

 per cent of the tubers. Of those sliowing color, 30 were mottled with white, 

 229 were flesh, 104 were red, 55 were purple, and one was violet-black. In 

 another instance, out of a population of 870 seedlings of Irish Cobbler crossed 

 with Keeper, color was absent in 69.7 per cent of the tubers. The pollen parent, 

 Keeper, being a red-skinned variety, it would seem that if white were recessive 

 a larger proportion of the Fi generation should have shown color." 



The work of Goodrich and other early breeders in the improvement of the 

 potato by selection are briefly discussed and the tuber-unit and hill-selection 

 methods described. 



It is stated that the almost total failure of our present-day commercial 

 varieties to produce seed balls is due to male sterility rather than to imperfect 

 pistils or ovaries, and that the tuber-unit and hill-selection methods are chiefly 

 valuable in pointing out the weak, unproductive, and diseased seed tubers. 



Report of the officer in charg'e of the Prickly Pear Experimental Station, 

 Bulacca, J. White {Ann. Rpt. Dcpt. Pub. Lands Queensland, 1913, pp. 66-7S, 

 pis. 3). — This gives in detail the methods employed in searching for ways and 

 means for the destruction of the prickly pear in Queensland. The effects of 

 different poisons applied by injections and by spraying, treating with poisonous 

 gases and vapors, and the use of parasitic insects are described. 



The prickly pear problem in Australia, C. F. Juritz (Reprint from Weekly 

 Cape Times and Farmers' Rec., 1915, Feb. 5, pp. I4, figs. 6). — This article gives 

 compiled results from various sources of methods for the eradication or utiliza- 



