36 



noted for its high weight and low per cent hull. The number of kernels per 

 spikelet by which sorts are characterized cannot therefore be regarded as an 

 indication even of quality. 



The present' attitude of Nilsson-Ehle and Tedin toward this question 

 is that a large number of kernels to a spikelet is indicative of higher yield 

 only in the case of fluctuating individuals within one and the same pure line, 

 but is of no special significance when it concerns the variety as a whole. 

 This may at first seem contradictory but one must keep in mind that yield 

 is the product of many different factors, so that it is quite possible for a sort 

 having many kernels to a spikelet to still give a relatively low yield. Inter- 

 esting investigations in Germany by Bohmer (4, p. 50) and in Norway by 

 Christie (10, p. 39) seem to confirm these conclusions. Christie worked with 

 ten pure lines of Norwegian grey oat, fourteen of Norwegian white oat and 

 eighteen of Probstier oats during 1909 and 1910. His studies show that the 

 greater the number of kernels in the spikelet the greater is the weight of kernels 

 per plant in the case of different plants within the same pure line, but in the 

 case of different pure lines this relationship is not shown. "In comparing 

 pure lines from the same old variety of oats I do not find," he says, "any 

 reason to attribute any special value to three-kernelled spikelets. The 

 absolute weight of kernels per plant gives much more certain information 

 regarding the productivity of the stock and is, moreover, essentially quicker 

 and easier to determine." 



While the value of different strains cannot be judged by the number of 

 kernels which are borne by each spikelet, yet a distinction can often be made 

 on this basis between different lots of the same strain grown under different 

 conditions. 



Environment plays an important part in determining the number of 

 kernels borne in the spikelet. Under certain conditions a sort which is 

 normally three-kernelled will develop only two-kernels in a large percentage 

 of the spikelets. Conversely a sort which is ordinarily classified as two- 

 kernelled may sometimes produce a large percentage of three-kernelled 

 spikelets. 



Relationship It has long been held by many that early maturity and high yield are 



between date antagonistic or, in other words, that high yield and late maturity are cor- 



of maturity re i a ted. This idea has had to be modified considerably within recent years 



owing to the appearance of a number of high yielding yet early maturing 



sorts. Thus at Svalof Sun wheat, Hannchen barley and Gold Rain oats, all 



high yielding sorts, are nevertheless relatively early maturers. 



. . As an example of the course of procedure followed when attempting to 



Primus isolate distinct botanical forms as mother plants on the basis of correlations, 



Barley. there is cited in one of the station journals (34, p. 51) the isolation of a form 



of brewing barley which afterwards received the name Primus. The account 



of the origin of this sort, as given in this article, is substantially as follows: 



Efforts to obtain a stiff strawed sort from the high quality but weak 



strawed Chevalier having failed, attention was turned, about 1893, to a stiff- 



strawed but poor quality" Imperial " barley with the hope that this perchance, 



might include forms having the short-haired rachilla of the Chevalier kernel 



(which was supposed to be correlated with high brewing quality) and at the 



