132 



QUERIES AND ANSWERS. 



A Seed, 

 What Is It? 



growth is so unreliable in this country, generally making stags or thick 

 necks ? 



A. There are several causes ; many varieties of high reputation in 

 Europe never doing well south of Canada. The varieties not acclimated 

 will not stand our semi-tropical sun ; some other sorts which sometimes 

 do well have proved to be unreliable because too often grown in climates 

 not favorable to the retention of their desired qualities — these causes and 

 others result in stags, bad shapes, mixed forms and colors, and very 

 often disappointment, and loss of crop. 

 New 825. Q. Are new sorts of potatoes, developed from the true seed col- 



Potatoes. lected from seed balls borne on top of the vines, more healthy than 

 potatoes grown from the eyes of tubers of established sorts? 



A. Often so, but not always. Seeds to produce healthly plants of any 

 kind must be grown from healthy plants ; consequently, if true potato seed 

 is picked off a vine of a potato plant which is unhealthy or running out, the 

 seed itself will be disposed to run out or develop some weakness. But the 

 seeds will vary, some will produce vines strong and desirable ; but the 

 majority from seed taken from unhealthy plants are entirely unreliable as 

 to constitution. 

 826. Q. What is a seed ? 



A. A seed is a ripened ovule, made vital or able to perpetuate by the 

 mysterious action of pollen working upon the female organs of the 

 flower from whence the seed sprang. Nearly all seeds have two coats 

 which surround the kernel, which latter, the kernel, may be the embryo 

 alone, or it may be surrounded by a protecting and food substance 

 termed the endosperm, variably farinaceous, oily, fleshy, corneous, or 

 horny. The embryo is that part of the seed which starts into growth and 

 develops the young plant, in fact it is the young plant in miniature. The 

 location of the embryo on the seed is variable according to the species. 

 In corn and wheat it is not in the interior, but on one side and on the 

 surface. 

 Onion Thrip. 827. Q. What can I do with my onion field on which a little insect has 

 almost destroyed the crop by eating the soft bark of the young plants ? 



A. If the insect referred to has eaten the cuticle of the leaves so that 

 they appear covered with minute whitish yellow spots almost touching, 

 making the field almost appear white, it is the work of the onion thrip. 

 It will also eat melon, squash, turnip and a number of other plants. Try 

 solution of whale oil soap or kerosene emulsion. 

 "Winter 828. Q. In this part of Virginia we grow white Winter wheat, but the 



Wheat. millers all want a flinty hard sort, and I want to know if I can profitably 



raise far Northern Spring wheats, which are all flint}^ by sowing them in 

 the Autumn ? 



A. You can ; and it is being done in many localities. They stand the 

 Winter when not very severe, and the second year, grown South, do 

 better than the first, because of having been acclimated, but by the third 

 season the grain loses its flinty quality, becoming mealy. 



