282 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



D;^. 



DMPROVEMENT OF WTIEAT. 



.11 







TROT WHEAT. 



We are anxious that an intelligent and sys- 

 tematic efTort be made to improve all the better 

 sorts of wheat grown in the United States. 

 To promote this ohjcrt, the Genesee Farmer 

 will pay a premium of five dollars to the person 

 who will send to the office the head of wlxcat 

 wliose seeds shall weigh more than the seeds 

 taken from any other single head. 



A premium of three dollars will be paid to 

 the one who shall produce the most weight of 

 grain from a single seed ; and 



A premium of two dollars for the head of 

 wheat containing the largest number of seeds, 

 regardless of their weigiit. 



The Secretary of the New York State Ag- 

 ricultural Society, B. P. Johnson, Esq., exhib- 

 ited heads of over sixty varieties of wheat at 

 the recent State Fair, which he obtained in 

 France. We examined these specimens with 

 Bome care ; and, apparently, none were supe- 

 rior in quality, or equal in size to several kinds 

 grown in this country. Some of them, how- 

 ever, are said to withstand the attacks of fungi 

 (rust and mildew) much better than American 

 wheats. On this account, if no other, the best 

 wheats grown in France deserve a fair trial in 

 our climates and soils. 



The reader will find in connection with this 

 article an exact likeness of two heads of beard- 

 ed wheat of the natural size, the one produced 

 from seed originally brought from the Mediter- 

 ranean by a naval officer who obtained it near 

 Mount Ilia, and we named it " Troy Wheat" in 

 pntting it up for distribution at the Patent Office. 

 The other is known by the name of " Austra- 

 lian Wheat," which sufficiently indicates its 

 origin. Both of these varieties deserve further 

 trial, and we shall be thankful for any facts 

 relating to either that may be of interest to 

 wheat -growers. Mr. Davidson, of Greece, 

 Monroe county, N. Y., has produced the best 

 heads of wheat that we have seen anywhere 

 this year ; and we hope that he will continue 

 his experiments. The best oats which have 

 been received at the Patent Office were from 

 the farm of the Hon. John M. Clayton, late 

 Secretary of State. 



Those that desire to produce large ears of 

 wheat, must not allow many stems to grow 

 from a single ?eed. A single one will doubt- 

 less be better than to permit more heads or ears 

 to mature. A half bushel of seed equally dis- 

 tributed over an acre, should each seed pro- 

 duce a plant and not one tiller, but all send up 

 eingle si ems each bearing one Imndred seeds, 

 the yield would be fifty bushels per acre. 



To grow a large per centage of wheat in 

 proportion to the straw, is an object of vast im- 

 portance in a national point of view ; and to 

 attain this result in a small way, let the exper- 

 in-enler saturate a few bushels of leached ashes 

 with chamber-lye, and apply the fertilizer in 

 Bucli a manner as to be thoroughly incorpora- 

 ted with the soil in which wheat is to grow, 

 and not so much as to injure it. 



It is our purpose to collect samples of all the 

 varieties generally known in the United States 

 for experiment, and we solicit a few seeds of 





1 



AUSTRALIAN WHEAT. 



