wS 
A Study of Colorado Wheat 
37 
able in wheat, and to climatic conditions. Under the latter head I sup¬ 
pose the principal factor considered is the rainfall or supply of water. 
Again, I know of no one more explicit in his statements than Ue Clerc, 
who discusses with clearness flinty and mealy wheats. He says: 
“Furthermore the wheat of the humid regions contains a larger percentage 
of mealy kernels showing that there is a very close relation between the 
percentage of protein and the percentage of flinty grains, that is, generally, 
the more flinty the kernels the higher is the percentage of protein. An 
excessive amount of rainfall or irrigation is almost always accompanied 
by a crop containing a low percentage of protein. This is further shown 
in the work done in 14 different localities in the far Western states, 7 of 
these places were irrigated and the percentage of protein averaged 12.1 
while in the 7 places where no irrigation was practiced the protein content 
of the wheat was 15.4 percent.”* In the next paragraph he describes two 
samples of wheat of which he says: '‘The non-irrigated samples consisted 
of flinty kernels entirely and contained 5.4 percent more protein than the 
^ _ 
original seed and 6.6 percent more protein than the irrigated sample. The 
irrigated sample contained, moreover, very few flinty kernels (only 20 per¬ 
cent).” Again, in commenting on the observations of Lawes and Gil¬ 
bert he writes : “ ‘The six seasons of bad crops showed rain to have fallen 
during each of the 199 days. The seasons of good crops had but 136 days 
during which it rained.”t The probable reason for such differences is that 
an excessive rainfall dilutes the nitrates in the soil too much and there 
being but small amounts of carbohydrates in the process of formation, owing 
to lack of sunshine, less protein is formed. The result is a mealy grain of 
low protein content.”§ In the same article is given excellent illustrations 
of flinty, half-flint}^ and mealy kernels and in the legends we find 
“Flinty wheat grain grown under dry farming”, “Starchy wheat grain 
grown under excessive irrigation”. If there were any doubt remain¬ 
ing in regard to what the author considered the cause of the mealiness 
of some kernels this would remove it. 
TOO MUCH IMPORTANCE ATTACHED TO CLIMATE 
In Bulletin 205 I showed that this condition is not due to injury 
by fungi, nor to the time of cutting, nor to \v(eathering, nor to climatic 
conditions, etc. The answer to these suggestions is given by pointing 
out the fact that we can produce flinty kernels by applying nitrates 
or increase the percentage of mealy berries by increasing the supply of 
potassium. While I do not for one moment doubt the importance of 
favorable weather conditions in the production of a good crop of 
wheat, I am convinced that too much importance has been attributed 
to this group of agents over and against the influence of the soil con- 
* Yearbook, U. S. D. A., 1906, p. 203. 
t Yearbook, U. S. D. A., 1906, p. 205. 
§ There were 199 and 136 days respectively on which 0.01 inch or more of rain 
fell. These are the mean number of days for each period. 
