648 HORTICULTURE, FORESTRY, FLORICULTURE 



for any variety except Early Amber for early maturing cane. In 

 Kansas the most frequent preference is for the varieties which pro- 

 duce the most seed ; for sorghum seed is a valuable product. The 

 fact that sorghum has been grown long and extensively with very 

 little selection of varieties has not been due to lack of intelligence on 

 the part of sirup makers, but to the variable amount from year to 

 year of the impurities in the juice of all the varieties. A variety 

 may be selected in one season because it produces good sirup ; it may 

 be rejected the next season because it produces poor sirup. Planted 

 early it may produce good sirup, and when planted late it may 

 produce poor sirup in the same season and on the same soil, yet 

 in both seasons it may produce ample and good-sirup-making ma- 

 terial. The impurities vary in amount, according as the growing 

 seasons are favorable or unfavorable. If the impurities are not well 

 removed from the juice, a part remains mixed in the sirup, and so if 

 the juice is naturally pure the sirup is pure; if the juice is impure 

 the sirup is inferior. This variable quality of sorghum sirup will 

 continue until sirup makers remove the impurity which causes 

 the variations. If two samples of good wine are to be compared, 

 to one of which impurity like that in sorghum juice has been added, 

 then the two samples can not be rightly compared until the im- 

 purity has been well removed. The same is true of two samples 

 of sirup from two varieties of sorghum. When both samples have 

 been refined, so that they are equally pure, then selection can be 

 made of the best variety, and then the excessively variable quality 

 of sorghum sirup from year to year will be largely done away with. 

 Removal of all the impurities from the juices of 100 varieties of 

 sorghum would show the true quality of each, and would surely lead 

 to the selection of a few varieties superior in flavor or other quality. 



For eight years careful search was made among hundreds of 

 varieties of sorghum for a variety which would usually give as pure 

 juice as that from sugar cane. Such a variety has not been found. 

 In the past three years the effort has been made to find ways of sep- 

 arating the excess of impurity from sorghum juice, so as to make it 

 as pure as sugar-cane juice naturally is. There is much promise in 

 this line of work. When that is accomplished, selection of superior 

 varieties can be made. At present no one can rightly name the best 

 varieties for any section or locality, except Early Amber, for early 

 maturing cane. But three varieties are recommended, Early Amber, 

 the best early variety; Collier, the richest in sugar; and Colman, 

 which produces good juice, larger, shorter canes, and more seed than 

 the others. 



Soil and Climate. The best sirup is produced where the grow- 

 ing seasons are uniformly favorable, neither too wet nor too dry, 

 and on soils of moderate fertility. A good growing season, followed 

 by a moderately dry ripening season, seems best in any section. An 

 even and proper supply of moisture appears to be much more im- 

 portant than the nature of the soil. In a very dry season rich and 

 moist lowlands often produce the best sirup. In a wet season arid 

 and poor uplands often produce the best sirup. It is probably true 



