44 MAINE AGRICULTUR.\L EXPERIMENT STATION. I915. 



Garton No. 5 92 Senator 85 



Gold Rain 99 Siberian 80 



Imported Scotch 87 Silver Mine 96 



Irish Victor 89 Swedish Select 83 



Lincoln ^ 88 Victor (black) 79 



Kherson 78 White Plume 91 



Tests of New Varieties of Oats Originated at Highmoor 



Farm. 



In addition to the testing of commercial varieties of oats the 

 Station has been engaged for several years in breeding new 

 varieties of oats that it is hoped will be better adapted to the 

 conditions in this State than any of the existing varieties. The 

 first part of this work was begun in 1910 and has now reached 

 a stage where the results ma}' be given to the public. 



In 1910 about 350 individual plants were selected for the 

 variety test plots of that year. In 191 1 the seed from each of 

 these plants was sown in a separate garden row. Thus the 

 plants in each row were the offspring of a single plant of the 

 year before. Careful notes were taken on each row, and those 

 which showed the most desirable characters were harvested and 

 threshed, each row by itself. The next year the seed of these 

 most promising rows was planted in small plots of 1-2000 acre. 

 This was necessary on account of the small amount of seed. 

 Notes were again made and only the best plots selected. Thus 

 out of 350 plants originally selected the offspring of 33 were 

 regarded as good enough to continue into 1-40 acre plots in 1913. 



In 1914, 31 of these "pure lines" were tested for the second 

 time in duplicate plots. These "pure lines" as they are called 

 are essentially new varieties. Each one of them has been devel- 

 oped from a single plant. Since the oat flower is always self- 

 pollinated each plant in one of these pure lines has the same 

 hereditary constitution as every other plant in that line. For 

 this reason plots of these pure lines are much more even in 

 ripening, in yield, in strength of the straw, and other characters, 

 than ordinary commercial varieties. Further, many of these 

 new varieties are proving superior in yield to any of the com- 

 mercial varieties so far tested. Out of the 31 pure lines tested 

 for two years 15 have been judged good enough to be offered 

 to the public. These pure lines will be tested further for several 



