78 



IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF WHEAT. 



each way, with one seed in each hill. Each plant was harvested 

 separately and the spikes from each placed in a separate envelope. 

 The following table gives the results, lot 1 in each case being com- 

 posed of the kernels from one-half the number of spikes on a plant, 

 and lot 2 of kernels from the remaining spikes. 



TABLE 16. Analyses of twenty-one plants, showing total nitrogen and proteid nitrogen. 



The above table shows a maximum difference of 0.38 per cent in 

 the content of total nitrogen of the two lots of spikes from one plant, 

 and of 0.46 per cent in the content of proteid nitrogen. The aver- 

 age difference is only 0.14 per cent and 0.13 per cent, respectively. 



These tables give unmistakable evidences that the average com- 

 position of a spike of wheat may be judged from the analysis of a 

 row of its spikelets, and that the average composition of all of the 

 spikes of a wheat plant is shown by an analysis of one-half the num- 

 ber. In practice it is better to take as the sample for analysis one 

 row of spikelets from each spike, and the remaining row of spikelets 

 from each spike for planting. 



In order to ascertain what variation occurs between the several 

 spikes on a single wheat plant, analyses were made of each spike 

 from a number of plants. On some plants there were more spikes 

 than on others, but every spike on each plant was analyzed. In the 

 following tabulation of these analyses the percentage of proteid 

 nitrogen is stated. 



