534 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION G2. 



approximate 60,000,000 bushels. The Secretary for Agriculture 

 in his report says that : — 



" Durum wheat has now made its place as a semi-dry land crop in the 

 middle Great Plains region, and is being rapidly extended into the inter- 

 mountain dry-land districts." 



A number of stations had been established in the dry country 

 where experimental work is carried on, and according to the 

 Secretary " the experimental work at each station is under the 

 charge of men specially qualified along the lines of grain improve- 

 ment and familiar with the territory in which the station is located. 

 . It is found that many of the farmers in this region who 

 are planting cereals grow mixed varieties. This alone has probably 

 as much to do with the low average yield per acre in the United 

 States as any other factor. One of the objects of the work in 

 question is to enable farmers to obtain pure seed of drought- 

 resistant kinds of wheats adapted to particular districts." I 

 think I need hardly say that the growing of pure seed wheat for 

 the supply of farmers was considered of the highest importance 

 by Mr. Farrer, and he worked hard to accomplish that object. 



The question as to manuring wheats was one about which 

 Farrer was much concerned, and plans were formulated for 

 making field experiments at Cowra. 



Quite recently some references were made in the press con- 

 cerning objections made by wheat buyers to one of the best known 

 and most popular of Farrer 's wheats — Federation — which was 

 considered by these buyers to be of low milling quality, but in 

 other parts of the country no such objections seem to have been 

 made. 



Referring to this wheat, in a letter to me dated 6th January, 

 1905, Farrer wrote : — 



" A curious and interesting apparent indication of the poorness of plant- 

 food, at anyrate in nitrogenous plant-food, of the wheat paddock in which 

 last year's wheats were grown at the Wagga farm came under my notice 

 only the other day. Federation grown at Wagga last year gave only 6^ per 

 cent, of gluten ; grown at Wagga on my plots in 1901 it contained 11-3 per 

 cent, not far off twice as much. It looks as if it may be that wheats 

 which possess the quality (like the French " Ble siegle " or rye wheat) of 

 thriving in poor soil do so because they can do with a less amount of plant- 

 food than can others, and that those which need soil such as Farmers' Friend 

 and Hudson's Early Purple Straw cannot do without plenty of nitrogenous 

 food. In view of what may be a lowness in albuminoids the flour of Federa- 

 tion is weaker than usual, owing to lack of nitrogen." 



Shortly before sending me the above information Farrer had 

 written : — 



" I have it in my mind to write to the Daily Telegraph pointing out that 

 if farmers were to get their wheats tested before they sold them they would 

 put themselves in a position to get good value for them, and that if some 

 system of selling wheats according to their intrinsic value were established 

 a force would be put into operation by means of which the improvement 

 of wheats for economic purposes would become progressive. This is a 

 subject I want to work at." 



