10 
BULLETIN 1030, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
WORK WITH MEADE COTTON IN 1919. 
Though adequate supplies of pure seed were not available for 
general planting in 1919, the stock was sufficient for a wide distri- 
bution of small experimental quantities of seed, besides a number of 
additional larger plantings in other sections of the Sea Island belt. 
On account of the failure of many of the Meade cotton growers 
of 1918 to avoid the contamination of their seed at the gins, it 
was anticipated that a large quantity of alleged Meade seed that 
contained a mixture of the Sea Island seed would be sold and planted 
in 1919. In view of the danger that the reputation for uniformity 
of the variety might suffer, efforts were made to determine the 
extent of mixture that actually occurred. Accordingly the names 
of those farmers who had purchased large quantities of Meade seed 
were learned, in order that their fields might be inspected. 
A visit to a number of these fields in the early season confirmed 
the suspicion that a mixture of seed had taken place at the gins, for 
it was found that with only one or two exceptions they contained a 
large percentage of pure Sea Island plants and practically no 
hybrids. These farmers were warned that their stock was not pure, 
that their crop would be a mixture of Sea Island and Meade cotton, 
and they were advised that, unless all the Sea Island plants were 
pulled up before flowering, they should dispose of their seed to oil 
mills at the end of the season. 
In striking contrast to these mixed fields was a planting of about 
100 acres of Meade cotton near Sylvester, Ga., where the 1918 crop 
had been ginned on a clean gin. Not a single pure Sea Island plant 
and not more than a dozen hybrid plants were found in the roguing 
of the entire acreage. The field was extremely uniform and demon- 
strated in a most satisfactory manner the possibilities of the va- 
riety under conditions of isolation and careful handling. 
Table 2. 
-Yields of Meade and Sea Island cottons in comparable fields of 12 
acres each on Little Edisto Island, S. C, in 1019. 
Pickings. 
Meade cotton. 
Date. 
Yield 
(pounds). 
Sea Island cotton. 
Date. 
Yield 
(pounds). 
First picking... 
Second picking. 
Third picking. . 
Fourth picking. 
Fifth picking... 
Sixth picking . . 
Total. 
Aug. 22 
Aug. 30 
Sept. 7 
Sept. 17 
Oct. 7 
Oct. 31 
302 
1,040 
1,253 
1,487 
2,657 
1,200 
Aug. 25 
Sept. 5 
Sept. 15 
Sept. 29 
Oct. 3 
Oct. 31 
190 
607 
733 
349 
769 
100 
7, 939 
2,748 
On Little Edisto Island. S. C, two fields of cotton, each of 12 
acres, were planted. One of the fields was planted to Meade and 
