ACALA COTTON IN CALIFORNIA 7 
ACALA PLANTING INCREASED BY THE FORMATION OF THE 
ASSOCIATION 
The organization of the association formed a nucleus of poten- 
tial Acala cotton growers, and the next step was to procure a sup- 
ply of Acala seed for the members. The association inquired at 
the United States Experiment Date Garden as to where a good sup- 
ply of Acala seed could be obtained for planting in the Coachella 
Valley. They were referred to W. B. Camp, the department repre- 
sentative at Bakersfield, Calif., who recommended the same cooper- 
ator in the Arvin-Weed Patch district of the San Joaquin Valley 
that had grown the Acala field in 1919 as having the only good sup- 
ply of Acala planting seed. This cooperator controlled much of 
the Acala seed produced by his neighbors in 1920, in addition to the 
seed produced on his own place. 
The association purchased 7 tons of this seed for planting in the 
Coachella Valley in 1921 and offered it for sale to anyone in the 
valley at the first cost plus freight and handling charges, which 
amounted in all to 7 or 8 cents a pound. All of the seed, however, 
was not sold, about 3 tons being carried over until the next spring. 
The owner of one of the gins in the valley also bought about 20 
tons of Acala seed from the same source in the San Joaquin Valley. 
DISTRIBUTION OF ACALA SEED PRODUCED AT THE UNITED 
STATES EXPERIMENT DATE GARDEN IN 1920 
The small fields of Acala cotton grown at the United States 
Experiment Date Garden in 1920 were rogued by representatives 
of the department and produced about 2y 2 tons of seed. The 
roguing process consists of removing off-type or " rogue " plants 
from the field. Small numbers of such plants will appear, even in 
well-bred stocks, and these are one of the causes of varieties running- 
out. Sometimes they are widely divergent or degenerate plants, or 
they may exhibit only slight variations from the type. Some " rogue " 
plants can be recognized in the early stages of development by the 
branching habit or by leaf, internode, and boll characteristics. 2 The 
fields are usually rogued shortly after the first flowers appear, be- 
fore there has been much opportunity for cross-pollination. Every 
plant in the field is examined by walking up and down the lanes 
between the rows. 
In order that a supply of pure Acala seed might be available for 
general planting in the Coachella Valley in 1922, arrangements for 
increasing the date-garden seed stock during 1921 were made. The 
seed was placed with three growers who had clean land; that is, 
land not previously in cotton and sufficiently isolated from other 
cotton fields to reduce the chances of cross-pollination. These 
growers were also required to see that the cotton was ginned sep- 
arately. They planted approximately 100 acres with the date- 
garden seed, and during the summer their fields were rogued by 
department representatives and others. 
- Cook, O. F. Cotton selection on the farm bv the characters of the stalks, leaves, and 
bolla. U. S. Dept. Agr., Bur. Plant Indus. Circ. 06, 23 pp. 1910. 
