550 EEPOET — 1891. 



Test experimentally the effect — • (1) of treatment with 

 manures ; (2) of treatment of soil with lime ; (3) treat- 

 ment with ferrous sulj^hate, &c. ; (4) of different kinds 

 of cultivation (deep, shallow, drainage, and so on) ; 

 (5) of using infected straw^ as manure ; (6) of burning 

 off infected stubble ; of disinfecting the soil by burn- 

 ing or otherwise. 



Demonstrate experimentally the relative value of plump, 

 healthy wheat-seed and of rust-shrivelled seed. 



Select as many as possible of the most rust-proof wheats, 

 both Australian and foreign, and cultivate in experi- 

 mental plots. Improve from these, both by systematic 

 selection and by cross-fertilisation. Continue this 

 improvement indefinitely, establishing a permanent 

 system of intercolonial co-operative exchange and 

 distribution of the best and most rust-resisting wdreats. 

 The latter portion of the work to be made self- 

 supporting. 



This programme, with a few modifications and additions,, 

 was subsequently adopted by the Intercolonial Conference as a 

 basis for action. 



At the sitting of the Conference Mr. Pearson duly proposed 

 that your Committee might be associated with the work as an 

 executive body, but the general feeling was against such an 

 arrangement, it being considered that the machinery already 

 existing in connection with the various Agricultural Depart- 

 ments would be sufficient for the work. This decision being 

 arrived at, there remained nothing further for your Committee 

 to do, as the work intrusted to it would necessarily be of a 

 costly kind, and it was not to be expected that the Government 

 would contribute to two independent organizations for the 

 performance of the same work. 



The appointment of your Committee has, however, had a 

 good practical result to the extent of reviving an interest in the 

 subject, and of giving a general direction to the work under- 

 taken in these colonies. The recent appointment of Govern- 

 ment Vegetarian Pathologists in New South Wales and 

 Victoria, and the inquiries and experiments now being carried 

 out in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, and South 

 Australia in connection with rust-investigations, may justly be 

 regarded as, to a certain extent, the outcome of the appoint- 

 nient of your Committee. 



