160 SUCCESSFUL FARMING 



2. The plats should be long and narrow rather than short and broad, 



and should extend across inequalities in the land rather than 

 parallel with them. 



3. A known standard variety should be planted in every third or 



fourth plat for comparison. 



4. Trials should be conducted for a number of years and the choice 



of a variety based upon the average performance rather than 



upon the results of only one year. 

 Suggestions are given in this chapter for the improvement of a few 

 crops. The methods of procedure with others would be similar, depend- 

 ing chiefly upon how the blossoms are fertilized and upon methods of 

 propagation. 



CORN 



Special care must be exercised in the purchase of seed-corn. This 

 crop tends to become adapted to local conditions and may not do well 

 when removed to different localities. Especially is there likely to be a 

 failure to mature when seed from a locality having a longer season is 

 bought. On the other hand, a wise selection of seed should enable a 

 farmer to adapt his corn better to his own conditions. 



Most of our best known varieties have thus been developed by con- 

 sistent selection of seed for a number of years on the same farm. The 

 well-known Learning variety was developed by J. S. Learning in Clinton 

 County, Ohio, by continuous selection, from a variety bought in Hamilton 

 County, Ohio, in 1855. By selection along the same line, this variety 

 was made very uniform. Reid's Yellow Dent, a very popular variety of 

 a well-defined type, originated with a cross between two varieties planted 

 in the same field by Robert Reid in 1846. The type was fixed in this 

 case also by continuous selection. Most farmers could not do better than 

 test a number of varieties to find a good one and then by careful selection 

 of seed try to make it better. 



The Ear-Row Method. — The most rapid improvement of corn is 

 accomplished by some ear-row (or ear-to-row) method of breeding. There 

 are a number of methods in use which vary in detail. By ear-row plant- 

 ing is meant the planting of each ear to be tested in a row by itself to 

 determine its productiveness and other desirable qualities. The rows 

 should be of such a length that not over half of the seed on an ear need 

 be planted. If the rows are three and one-half feet apart and the hills 

 three feet apart, forty-two hills will comprise approximately one one- 

 hundredth of an acre. Five or six grains should be planted in a hill and 

 when the corn is up, it should be thinned to three stalks per hill. Mixed 

 seed of the variety should be planted for a check every sixth row. During 

 the growing season the rows should be observed and desirable or undesir- 

 able characteristics noted. 



Each row should be harvested separate!}'. Since the yield of stover 



