60 TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY REPORT. 
carried on with different classes of animals. From the results so 
obtained conclusions were being drawn as to methods of practice. 
Dr. Sturtevant rendered useful service in showing by actual field 
trials the possibilities of very large errors from the assumption that 
plats of equal size would produce equal quantities of grain or other 
products. He conducted tests with sorghum, corn and potatoes 
where the plats were given as nearly uniform treatment as it was 
possible to give. During several years’ work he found differences 
between duplicate plats of corn ranging from 14.3 bushels per acre 
to 39.2 bushels. With potatoes the differences ranged from 12 
bushels per acre to 107 bushels. Dr. Sturtevant reached the sane 
conclusion that field experiments conducted on such a basis were 
utterly unreliable as a means of testing either methods of treatment 
and cultivation or the relative efficiency of fertilizers. The de- 
crease in the number of field experiments conducted in the manner 
tested is an indication that the unreliability of the methods previ- 
ously followed is generally recognized. To secure safe conclusions 
from plat experiments is a much more difficult matter than was at 
first supposed. Such preliminary work was needed and it served 
as a corrective of unsafe conclusions. 
THE WORK ACCOMPLISHED BY THE STATION. 
In the development of its work it cannot be said that the Station 
has given proportionate attention to each one of the agricultural 
industries, large or small. General farm crops, vegetable gardening, 
floriculture and bee keeping have either held a minor place in the 
efforts of the Station staff or have received very little or practically 
no attention in the way of investigation. The phases of agriculture 
which have received most prominent attention are dairying and 
fruit culture. There are at least two reasons for this limitation of 
Station work: One is that dairying and fruit raising are our lead- 
ing agricultural industries, and the ones that offer the most at- 
tractive and the most available opportunities for helpful service. 
The second reason is that as it is not possible to carry on very 
many lines of inquiry at the same time, it has seemed advisable to 
select those problems of the largest importance. Those who have 
not engaged in scientific investigation do not appreciate how time- 
consuming and energy-consuming a single piece of research is. 
For these reasons many problems have remained untouched, some 
of them important, and doubtless it has often been felt that the 
limits of the Station work have been too narrow. 
od, i 
