48 Seed Wheat. 



Conserving seed for future use. 



The relative advantages of conserving seed from extra good years, and of procuring it 

 from a distance may be compared as follows. The cost of conserving includes : 



1. Vermin-proof receptacle (cost, interest on outlay, deterioration, insurance). 



2. Interest and insurance on the conserved seed, and deterioration, if any. 

 The cost of securing from another district includes : 



1. Freight and hauling. 



2. Extra on the price i.e., profit to the seller. 



3. To which must be added risks difficult to enumerate or valuate. 



As a vermin-proof bin to hold 250 bushels can be constructed for under 5, upon which 

 the annual charges need not exceed 5s. for deterioration, repairs, insurance, and interest, 

 and as the interest, insurance, and deterioration on 250 bushels of wheat produced on the 

 spot, and valued at 2s. per bushel, need not exceed 1 per annum, it will be seen that 

 the expenses on the storage side of the question are such as to compare favourably with 

 those on the other side. Probably, in most cases, if the object was to provide against 

 one bad season in four or five, the balance would be in favour of the system of conserving 

 one's own seed. I should, however, hesitate to recommend this conservation of seed 

 wheat to careless unobservant growers, though I think there would be money in it for 

 the wide-awake wheat growers. 



Cost and utility of Graded Seed. 



Apart from the advantage to be gained from the use of graded seed of uniform size, 

 there is the advantage gained from the fact that uniform seed can be sown more evenly 

 from the drill in case that method of sowing is adopted, as it undoubtedly should be. 



No farmer should allow himself to forget that all the various items of cost in connection 

 with grading and selecting seed are much reduced by selecting from his crop, before it 's 

 harvested, certain good portions to be taken off specially for seed purposes. Such portions 

 should be allowed to ripen fully before cutting, and be kept separate, to be cleaned 

 and graded for seed purposes. This precaution of setting aside some of the best parts of 

 the standing crop for seed will reduce the cost of first-class seed by a large percentage, 

 and the resulting seed will be better than could be obtained by any other method what- 

 ever. Considering its value, it is marvellous how often this precaution is neglected. 



Where the elevator system is in use there are facilities for the preparation of seed- 

 wheat at a minimum cost. The grading machines in use in the elevators are of large 

 size, and their capacity, and the fact that they are run by experts, places their product 

 beyond competition as to price. As to quality, however, there are some drawbacks, 

 principally in the direction of the purity of the sample, there being a great risk that seed 

 from the elevators will be mixed, and more or less diseased, from the fact that none of 

 these machines are treated for fungus diseases at least, so far as I know, and I have 

 made particular inquiries. 



Apart from these considerations, for which remedies may be applied, the use of elevators 

 leads to improvement in the quality of seed- wheat, as anyone may observe in regions 

 where elevators are in use. The smaller country elevators, where they are supplied with 

 cleaning machines, do a considerable business in returning seed-wheat to farmers. The 

 cleaner most in vogue in the United States appeared to me to be that of the Silver Creek 

 Grain -clean ing Company, of Silver Creek, New York. These cleaners are, however, 

 designed especially for rapid work on a large scale, the object being to meet the 

 commercial demands of the elevator owners, and it cannot be claimed for them that they 

 turn out a sample equal to the types with a slower action especially designed for seed 

 grain. Nevertheless, in a region characterised by careless farming, the good effects of 

 elevator seed are manifest. 



We have been considering this question of the relative seed-values of large and small 

 grains hitherto wholly from a narrow and strictly and directly utilitarian point of view. 

 There is another and higher point of view that should not be lost sight of, and that is the 

 effect on the wheat industry of the constant effort to secure larger crops through the use 

 of graded seed. Small plants will not produce large seeds, at any rate in the same propor- 

 tion as large plants, and from this it follows that the constant breeding from the progeny 

 of large and hence healthy plants, that follows on the practice of grading, must be in the 

 long run of great benefit. Though it may be too small to be worth the consideration 

 of the grower, this benefit accumulating by minute and imperceptible increments must 

 be the main foundation for the hope of improvement in the wheat plant. It is needless 

 to point out that all improvements in the quality of the wheat plant it hardly matter's 

 how small they are will be of vast benefit to the human race as a whole. Leaders in 

 agricultural progress should, and no doubt do, receive from this thought great stimulus, 

 and working as they do on the borderland of economic science where they are shut off from a 

 full appreciation of their efforts and where from the nature of the case they are occasionally 

 grievously misunderstood, they occasionally stand in need of some stimulus of this kind. 



