230 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



The New Era and Groit varieties of co%^Toeas are noted as being successful 

 green-manure crops used in securing good stands of alfalfa on light soils, as they 

 increased the water-holding capacity of such soils. 



Tabulated data show the amounts of water applied to the various crops and 

 the yields in the several tests. 



Influence of the mode of cultivation on the chemical composition of the 

 grains of cereals, S. S. F. Teetiakov {Trudy Poltav. Selsk. Khoz. Oyytn. 

 ^tantsii. No. 12 {1913), pp. 28-44; abs. in Zhxir. Opytn. Agron. {Russ. Jour. 

 E.ept. Landto.), 15 {1914), No. 1, pp. 83, 84). — This gives results of analyses of 

 the grains of winter and spring wheats, winter rye, oats, and barley cultivated 

 under various conditions of fertilization and soil preparation. 



^Vith barnyard manure the protein content of spring wheat was increased 

 from 13.48 to 16.13 per cent, of winter rye from 11.69 to 13.3S per cent, of spring 

 wheat from 13.69 to 14.94 per cent, and of oats from 11.38 to 12.81 per cent. The 

 phosphorus content of winter wheat was increased from 0.77 to 1.22 per cent. 

 Leguminous plants, annual and perennial, in preceding the cereals apparently 

 increased the protein content of the latter, the influence of the perennial plants 

 being more pronounced. "With corn preceding summer wheat tlie protein content 

 of the latter increased from 13.38 to 16.2.J per cent. Potatoes apparently in- 

 creased the phosphorus content of the summer Avheat immediately following, 

 while mangels produced a contrary effect. With black fallow, nonfertilized, the 

 protein content of winter and summer wheats which followed the winter cereals 

 was increased but not the protein content in rye and oats. 



Natural wheat-rye hybrids, C. B. Leighty {Jour. Amer. Soc. Agron., 7 

 {1915), No. 5, pp. 209-216, pis. 2). — In this article the author compares the 

 characteristics of several heads of cereals, found in different fields of wheat, 

 with tliose of artificial hybrids of rye on wheat. 



He concludes that the hybrids found were produced by the fertilization of 

 wheat flowers with rye pollen, basing his conclusion on the following reasons : 

 "(1) The plants were found growing in plats of wheat; (2) no sc^d has ever 

 been secured by any plant breeder, so far as reported, by fertilizing rye flowers 

 Avith wheat pollen. In the writer's own experience no less than 80 rye flowers 

 have been pollinated with the pollen from several different kinds of wheat, and 

 no seed has ever'T)een secured. The reciprocal cross is, however, not readily 

 secured. In the writer's experience, again, no less than 173 flowers of different 

 kinds of wheat have been pollinated with rye pollen, and only 4 seeds have been 

 secured, these being in a single head. 



" Taking all these things into consideration, it seems evident that the plants 

 found are first-generation hybrids of wheat and rye, the seeds from which they 

 grew having been produced by natural fertilization of wheat flowers with rye 

 pollen. In no other way can the facts be explained." 



Winter grain in South Dakota, A. N. Hume, M. Champlin, and J. D. 

 Morrison {South Dakota Sta. Bui. 161 {1915), pp. 227-261, figs. 11).— This bul- 

 letin records experimental work carried on in cooperation with this Department 

 at farms in five sections of the State, representing the different soil and cli- 

 matic conditions. Climatic and soil conditions for each locality are given. 



At Brookings it was found that after several years' trials both winter wheat 

 and winter rye could be grown successfully, the wheat yielding as high as 34.2 

 bu. per acre and the rye 46.8 bu. Seeding with a double-disk drill on plowed 

 and harrowed land or in high corn stubble gave better results than other meth- 

 ods. Wheat apparently was most profitable when seeded at the rate of 4 to 5 bu. 

 and rye at the rate of 3 pk. per acre. 



