74 THE POTATO 



Cockle Park, Professor Gilchrist found similar 

 results, but found that these were only in accord- 

 dance with the experience of growers seventy or 

 eighty years ago. 



"At date of writing, the latest series of experi- 

 ments recorded in this connection is a most ex- 

 haustive one from the Lancashire County Council 

 farm, where four different tests, all in duplicate, 

 were carried out with wonderfully uniform results, 

 which led the experimenters to draw the following 

 conclusion viz., seed potatoes brought from a 

 northern to a southern latitude give a larger crop 

 than those from a southern to a northern latitude, 

 the difference, according to this experiment, being 

 on the average about one hundred bushels per acre. 



"If the English growers not only learn to box 

 and spray as the Irish farmers are learning to do, 

 but also learn that seed potatoes brought from a 

 northern to a southern latitude give a crop of three 

 tons per acre more than English-grown seed, that 

 will all make for a greatly increased average yield 

 per acre in England and a comparatively lower 

 range of prices per ton. 



As already noted, there is no variety of potato 

 on the market which is not more or less susceptible 

 to the disease, though undoubtedly some varieties 

 show much greater capacity for resisting the 

 disease than others. It is also a notorious fact 

 that many of the new varieties of potatoes which 

 have been put on the market within the last few 

 years at fabulous prices, as being practically im- 

 mune against the disease, have proved to be quite 

 as liable to succumb to the attack of the dreaded 

 fungus as any of the well-proved standard vari- 

 eties which have been before the public for a dozen 

 years or more. Judging from the experience of the 



