NOTES. 



Colorado College and Station. — Carl H. Potter, assistant in horticulture, has 

 ])een granted leave of absence for one year on half pay. Mr. Potter will remove to 

 the vicinity of Grand Junction, and will there act as field agent and investigator for 

 the agricultural college. The resignation of C. F. Mergelman as florist has been 

 accepted, to take effect January 1. Joseph Lownes, who has for two years been 

 assistant chemist at the station, died December 9. A short course of two or three 

 weeks for canal superintendents and State water commissioners has been authorized 

 by the State board of agriculture, to be given in the spring. This is intended to give 

 them fuller knowledge of their duties in the distribution of water, which 'is an impor- 

 tant part of their work. 



Georgia Station. — This station is erecting a greenhouse in addition to the propa- 

 gating house already in use, and will undertake investigations and experiments in 

 winter forcing of vegetables, etc., and such lines of biological work as require such 

 facilities. 



Iowa College and Station. — The main building of the agricultural college, one 

 of the oldest on the campus, was destroyed by fire December 8, 1900. The building 

 contained the botanical department of both the college and station, which suffered 

 heavily. The Parry herbarium was saved, except the duplicates, which were nearly 

 all burned. A part of the grass collection was saved and a few of the other speci- 

 mens. The general collection contained about 80,000 specimens, more than 50,000 

 of which were burned, besides several thousand duplicate specimens. This collec- 

 tion included many Western plants, repre«enting four years of collecting, and sets of 

 plants from Porto Rico, Cuba, and Mexico. Much of the library of the botanical 

 department, as well as the private library of the botanist, was destroyed, and most 

 of the microscopes and other apparatus were burned. A manuscript on the grasses 

 of the State and one on thistles were also lost, together with a number of smaller 

 papers ready for publication. 



Kansas College and Station. — Tait Butler has been elected to the chair of veteri- 

 nary science made vacant by the resignation of Paul Fischer. 



New Mexico College and Station. — All departments of the college and station 

 were represented in the exhibit made at El Paso during the midwinter carnival in 

 Januar}\ The biological department of the college has received a large amount of 

 zoological matei'ial, principally for study and dissection by students, which makes its 

 equipment in these lines by far the best in the Territory. One of the finest wild 

 roses in America has been discovered and described by the station botanist, having 

 been found growing wild in the Organ and Sacramento mountains. Not long since 

 a small weed, growing profusely on the mesas and in the valleys, was found to pos- 

 sess qualities which apparently make it valuable as a substitute for litmus, and it 

 is more than possible that this little weed can be demonstrated to be valuable to 

 commerce. 



Tennessee University and Station. — M. Ja(!ob, V. M. D., a graduate of the veteri- 

 nary department of the University of Pennsylvania and formerly house surgeon of 

 that institution, and more recently connected with the meat-inspection service of the 

 Bureau of Animal Industry of this Department, has been appointed instructor in 

 veterinary science at the university and consulting veterinarian of the station. 



National Irrigation Congress. — The ninth annual session of the National Irri- 

 gation Congress was held in Chicago, 111., November 21-24, 1900. There were in 

 11989— No. 5 8 ^ 499 



