Seed Wheat. 



3 



varieties of wheat. They were indeed eloquent and convincing, 

 though silent, arguments against the use of anything but large and 

 plump seed. 



To this day growers of a conservative type have not ceased to tell 

 me that these little demonstration plots were the means of opening 

 their eyes to the fact that the extra number of seeds in a bushel of 

 pinched wheat was not all that had to be taken into consideration in 

 connection with the comparison of large and small grain for seed pur- 

 poses, and that further trials have convinced them of the advisability 

 of using the large grains for seed. 



This is not to be wondered at, for no one could fail to see, if he 

 examined the demonstration plots with care, that the plants from large 

 and plump need were not only larger but healthier and more resistant 



2-50 



2-25 



2-00 



Fig. 3. Three sieves of varying mesh from 2'50 millimetres to 2*00 millimetres ; shown 

 about one-tenth natural size. 



Figures 2 and 3 show the kind of sieves used in testing the quality of seed-wheat for this report. The sieves are 

 made from " half-round " brass wire, placed with the flat side down. They were specially made with accuracy. 



to all adverse conditions. They suffered less from disease if disease 

 appeared, and they more readily surmounted the difficulties placed in 

 their way by bad patches of soil or by scanty rainfall. 



Rev. E. E. Hale, consoling with one too sensitive about unfavour- 

 able comments in the public prints, remarked that of all the people 

 who saw the print not half would see the item in question ; and of 

 those who saw it, half would not read it ; and of the half that read it, 

 half would not understand it ; and of the half that understood it, half 

 would forget ; and that under such a haphazard process the ones that 

 remembered probably would not amount to much any way. 



It is some such thought as this that leads me to emphasise the 

 advisability of demonstration plots at our colleges and farms and 

 wherever else we can present them. I fear that experts are terribly 

 prone to over-estimate the number of people that read their lucubrations, 

 and if these be sifted according to Dr. Hale's keen-witted method it 

 will be seen that our printed teachings stand in need of all the 

 reinforcement possible. 



