1909.] PUBLIC DOCUMENT — No. 31. 27 



The total net addition to all lists during the past year has 

 .been 3,175. 



Asparagus Substation, Concord. 



It will be remembered that the substation work with aspara- 

 gus in Concord is located on land leased of Mr. Charles W. 

 Prescott. This work was begam in the spring of 1906. The 

 leading lines of investigation are two: (1) breeding experi- 

 ments, with a view esj^ecially to the production of a desirable 

 type of asparagus with greater capacity to resist rust; (2) fer- 

 tilizer experiments. 



During the past year a new line of work has been begun in 

 a small way, i.e., experiments to determine the effects of the 

 cultivation of asparagus under tent shade, after the manner 

 which has been successfully followed in the production of cer- 

 tain grades of tobacco. This station enjoys the co-operation of 

 the Bureau of Plant Industry of the United States Department 

 of Agriculture in the breeding and tent experiments. 



Breeding Experiments. — During the past year the number 

 of varieties and selections of varieties of asparagus brought 

 together has been still further largely increased. The total 

 number of such varieties and selections now growing in the 

 experimental plots is 105. Most of these selections have made 

 an excellent gro\\i:h. They exhibit, as might be expected, wide 

 differences in habit and vigor of growth as well as in capacity 

 to resist the attacks of rust. Mr. J. B. Norton, an expert of 

 the Bureau of Plant Industry, was stationed in Concord during 

 the latter part of the summer. He was engaged in making 

 close observations and study of the different types, and in 

 selecting such as seemed to possess characteristics likely to 

 render them valuable for the purposes in view. Mr. Norton 

 will devote most if not all of his time to work in Concord next 

 season, and the actual work of hybridizing will then begin. 



Fertilizer Experiments. — The plants in the fertilizer plots 

 have continued to make excellent growth. Those in the dif- 

 ferent plots now exhibit considerable variation, due, no doubt, 

 to the varying fertilizer treatment. The past season is the 

 second season since the plants were set, and so vigorous has 

 been their growth that commercial cutting was begun in a 

 small way last spring. It is not deemed best to present results 



