307 
These figures show eccentricities from year to year in the same vari- 
ety, but the peculiarities of the varieties are much larger than these 
eccentricities. Sturtevant suggests that actinism has an influence 
scarcely second to temperature. 
SORGHUM. 
UNITED STATES. 
W. E. Stone (Agr. Sci., Vol. IV, p. 166) summarizes the results 
of the experiments on sorghum published by Wiley in Bulletins Nos. 
20 and 26, Division of Chemistry, United States Department of 
Agriculture. He says the controlling conditions of success are suit- 
able soil and climate, proximity of cane fields to the factory, supply 
of water and fuel, cost of the factory, and careful control of its 
operations. All experience points to southern central Kansas as the 
region best adapted to the growth of the sorghum. In New Jersey 
the plant, which at one time gave hopeful results, has deteriorated 
until it has become a worthless variety for sugar making, or even for 
the production of sirup. In Louisiana the results were disappoint- 
ing in seasons which were the most favorable for the sugar cane. At 
Conway Springs, Kans., the average percentage of cane sugar was 
12.42 in 1888 and 11.98 in 1889, being the best record of all. 
In general, with a normal amount of moisture, and other things 
being equal, the percentage of sugar depends upon the amount of 
sunshine received; excessive moisture is detrimental, as it directly 
interferes with nutrition and indirectly as being accompanied by 
cloudiness. 
A mean temperature of 70° F. is the minimum necessary to mature 
early varieties. The semiarid region south of the isotherm of 70° F. 
in the southwest central portion of the United States is best adapted 
to the growth of sorghum. Last of the Mississippi the recurrence of 
wet seasons renders the crop uncertain. A permanently improved 
plant can certainly be developed from existing varieties by selection. 
OATS. 
KANSAS. 
During the drought of 1890 the Kansas Agricultural Experiment 
Station secured the following comparative observations: On un- 
plowed land the yield of listed oats was 2.4 bushels per acre better 
than on plowed land; the yield of drilled oats was 1 bushel per acre 
better on unplowed land; the yield of oats cultivated into the soil 
was 5 bushels per acre better on the unplowed land; the oats sown 
broadcast on plowed land gave the same results as the oats cultivated 
into unplowed land; the oats plowed under gave the least harvest of 
2667—05 m——22 
