ALASKA AND STONEE, OR ^'^ MIRACLE, ' WHEATS. 11 



yielded in a siinilar test about 7 bushels per acre. In 1914 at this 

 place on a plat containing 1/142 of an acre it yielded at the rate of 

 18.9 bushels per acre, while Fife and bluestem wheats yielded at the 

 rate of 8.3 and 9.5 bushels per acre, respectively, in similar tests. 



At Chico, Cal., in 1912, out of 57 selections tested, Alaska wheat 

 ranked forty-third. 



In the Judith Basin, Mont., Alaska wheat was sown in the fall of 

 1908, but winterkilled. 



These results, meager as they are, indicate that Alaska wheat is not 

 a valuable wheat in respect to yield in many parts of the central and 

 western United States. 



Alaska wheat has been tested for several years in short rows at 

 the Arlington Farm, at Kosslyn, Va., and has done very poorly there. 

 It has never yielded much more than the seed sown and has usually 

 yielded less than this quantity. It is clearly not a valuable wheat for 

 the eastern part of the United States. 



Alaska wheat has usually proved a total failure or has given poor 

 results when it has been tried in a small way at the various stations 

 of the United States Department of Agriculture. This and its known 

 inferiority as a milling wheat are responsible for its not being sown 

 in the plats along with other varieties that are being tested. Usually 

 only the better wheats are included in such tests. 



This wheat, either under its present name of Alaska or under some 

 of its earlier names, has doubtless been tried on many types of soil in 

 many parts of the United States in the course of the last century. 

 That it has never become established indicates apparently that it is 

 not a valuable variety under any of the conditions where it has been 

 grown. It has remained for promoters to resurrect it time and again 

 and, aided by its striking and unusual appearance, to sell it to the 

 unwary at exorbitant prices. Agricultural literature abounds in 

 instances of this deception. 



MILLING TESTS OF ALASKA WHEAT. 



Regarding the tests made at the Idaho station,^ it may be said that 

 milling and baking tests were made of wheat "secured at the ware- 

 house in Juliaetta from the spring and winter Alaska wheat stored 

 there " and of a good grade of Little Club wheat. Without going into 

 details regarding these tests, the following quotation indicates what 

 results were secured: 



The results uniformly bear out the laboratoriy experience that there is very 

 little difference in the baking qualities of flour obtained from the Little Club 

 wheat and that obtained from the Alaska wheat. The Little Club is a soft 

 wheat grown extensively in this part of the State, both as a spring and winter 



1 Data from the following : French, H. T., and Jones, J. S. Alaska wheat investigation. 

 IdaBo Agr. Exp. Sta. Bui. 65, 12 p. 1908. 



