18 COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE AND DAIRYING 
crop was produced from seed selected from the plot grown from the seed from big 
heads of the previous year. We are trying to establish a system whereby that practice, 
or the application of the principles underlying it, will be kept up, so that it can never 
be lost out of the farming of Canada. You see what a splendid vista of progress and 
promise and profit that opens up. In that main competition we have paid altogether 
174 prizes, amounting to a:total of $5,425, so that altogether we have paid $10,842 in 
prizes. The $10,000 which Sir William C. Macdonald put into the bank, with the in- 
terest, has brought me out square, plus a great deal of valuable information, plus 
much happiness in administering the work. ; -* 
By Mr. Ross (Ontario): 
Q. I suppose you will give us the result of your experiment? 
A. Yes; but the results reached are not easy to define. Only 450 competitors went 
through with the competition; that is, only that number had selected seed for the 
quarter-acre seed plots up to and including the third year. About 800 started in, but 
all of them did not continue to the end. It was necessary that teachers or parents 
should supervise the measurements and weighings and send us certificates as to the work. 
I also got our dairy instructors, institute lecturers and travelling inspectors to help 
in the work by visiting these children wherever it was practicable and-convenient. In 
addition I wrote the competitors three or four letters a year, asking them for in- 
‘formation and encouraging them. That has brought about a fine relationship between 
these young people and our department. Some of them are getting their fathers to 
send them to an agricultural college, others are staying longer at school. 
Regarding the crops which were grown in 1902 from the selected seed, 92 per cent 
of the reports said on behalf of parents and guardians that the quarter-acre plots 
carried crops decidedly more vigorous and heavy than the crops from the same varieties 
of grain grown on the same farm in the same season from unselected seed. That was 
the report of 92 per cent of the parents or guardians. 
Let me restate some features of the competition to make them clear. The com- 
petitor was required to pick by hand the largest heads from the most vigorous and 
productive plants, in sufficient quantity to obtain seed from those heads to sow a quarter 
of an acre, which became the stock seed grain plot. Before the crop of the quarter of 
an acre was harvested, the competitor again selected by hand. the largest heads from 
the most vigorous plants, in sufficient quantity to sow the quarter of an acre, which 
became the stock seed grain plot for the following year. Out of the large heads 
selected every year the competitors sent to me at Ottawa one hundred of the largest. A 
careful record was kept of the number of grains per hundred heads, and also the weight 
of grains per hundred heads. These boys and girls were not biased in favour of an; 
theory, but the records of their work show that there was a remarkable increase in three 
years in the number of grains per hundred heads, and also in the weight of the grains 
per hundred heads. The percentage of increase from the crop of 1900 to that from the 
crop of 1903, on the average for all Canada, was 18 per cent of increase in the number of 
grains per hundred heads of spring wheat, and 28 per cent of increase it the weight 
of grains per hundred heads. In oats the figures were 19 per cent of increase in the 
number of grains per hundred heads, and 27 per cent of increase in the weight of 
grains per hundred heads. That is a record from several hundred seed grain plots 
operated by boys and girls. The plots and farms where these seed grain plots were 
carried on, were visited in many cases, and it was learned that the operators themselves, 
and neighbouring farmers, said that the crops grown on these plots from selected sced 
were heavier and better, and that the plants were more vigorous than those produced on 
the other parts of the farm from the ordinary seed of the same variety without system- 
atic selection. When results so notable as those can be gained by three years of in- 
telligent labour, what do you think is possible in thirty years, when this practice be- 
comes the common one for grain growing onthe farms throughout Canada? 
