24 



siderable revenue from the sale of flax seed. In such cases, however, the virgin 

 fertility of the soil scarcely makes up for the imperfect tilth obtained and the late 

 seeding usually practised on new lands. 



Though the flax plant, in all its varieties, never entirely loses its partiality for a 

 fine, rich soil and abundant, even moisture, it is in the yield of fibre rather than in 

 the quantity of seed produced that the effects of the lack of such conditions appear. 

 What to some plants would mean extinction of life causes with flax chiefly a change 

 of character. Thus the great seed-producing areas of the world Argentina, the 

 steppes of Kussia, India, the northwestern United States, and northwestern Canada 

 are regions of only moderate rainfall, while the great fibre lands are favoured with 

 a heavier precipitation. 



This tendency of certain areas to specialize on seed production and to ignore the 

 fibre is partly due also to the wholesale methods followed in new countries, to the 

 limited demand for poor flax fibre, and to the fallacy that because the fibre of seed 

 flax is not ordinarily suitable for fine spinning it cannot therefore be utilized by the 

 spinner at all. 



FLAX STRAW. 



It is to the credit of flax that satisfactory returns have been obtained by the wes- 

 tern farmers without any revenue at all from the straw. This refers to new lands, on 

 which flax is frequently the only possible crop. When farms have settled down into 

 an era of crop rotation, justice to the plant demands that the straw be made to con- 

 tribute its proper share of revenue. 



This might be accomplished by attention to the following: 



1. Closer cutting and more careful handling and threshing of the crop. 



2. Heavier sowing than at present practised. 



3. The introduction of high-yielding types of fibre flax, or selections toward 

 the same end, from varieties already being grown. 



4. Harvesting at an earlier stage depending somewhat on after-ripening 

 to secure a crop of seed. 



In support of the contention that the saving of the fibre is compatible with a 

 higher yield of seed, I give below comparative results in Ontario and Saskatchewan 

 for the period 1910-14, the flax for fibre area in Ontario being, of course, included : 



Average yield of seed in Ontario bushels. 19 



" " Saskatchewan " ] t) 



Average yield of straw in Ontario tons (estimated). 13 



" " Saskatchewan ton. 



Of course the fibre produced in Saskatchewan under what might be called seed- 

 flax conditions, in so far as climatic conditions affect it, would probably not be so 

 valuable as that produced in the fibre fields of Ontario, but neither would the cost 

 of producing and saving this fibre be nearly as great. The demand for flaxes of all 

 qualities is now so strong (and likely to remain so for several years) that inviting 

 prices are being offered for fibre of a grade normally not considered on the market. 

 For example, only recently an Ontario flax manufacturer stated that he was selling 

 scutched flax from green (not retted) straw at 10 cents a pound on board cars at his 

 own station. 



Recent investigations in Minnesota indicate an effort to gain for flax a per- 

 manent place on old lands in that state by turning the straw to some account. If 

 only from its salvage character there is a good deal .to be said for this movement. 

 It is probable that if more attention were paid to the study of how to supply the 

 desired material for these markets, and some effort made to develop new ones, a 

 valuable industry might be established. 



