THE WHEAT CULTTJEIST. 



259 



ers who never save their seed with care will doubt 

 it." 



The Commissioner of Agriculture recorded the fol- 

 lowing fact in regard to the degeneracy of the Hunter 

 wheat, which corroborates what I have penned. He 

 writes : " Hunter's wheat, one of the oldest and most 

 esteemed varieties in Scotland, was discovered half a 

 century ago by the roadside in Berwickshire. Through 

 long culture and want of care this variety has greatly 

 deteriorated." 



In searching agricultural documents for facts on this 

 subject, I have been greatly surprised to meet with so 

 long a list of once excellent varieties of wheat, entirely 

 run out, so that they are no longer cultivated. It is a 

 serious and grave accusation against American tillers of 

 the soil, that as a general rule, the wheat crop is neg- 

 lected and shamefully abused ; and I often wonder that 

 we raise half as good crops as we now meet with. 



When to Sow Winter Wheat. 



Winter wheat may be sowed too early in the season 

 as well as too late. Every intelligent farmer will ad- 

 mit this fact. There must be, therefore, a certain 

 period, midway between the too-early and the too-late 

 time, which may be fixed upon, as the most proper pe- 

 riod of all the growing season, to put in the seed. In 

 designating any given period as the best time to sow 

 winter wheat, there are considerations of transcendent 

 importance to be observed, each and all of which will 

 be found to exert more or less influence on the wheat 

 crop. The growing wheat has destructive enemies to 

 encounter, which flourish only at certain periods in the 



