VARIATION IN THE KHERSON OAT AT AKRON, 
COLORADO 1 
By F. A. Coffman:, Associate Agronomist, and T. R. Stanton, Agronomist in 
charge of Oat Investigations, Office of Cereal Investigations, Bureau of Plant 
I ndustry 2 
INTRODUCTION 
Few oat varieties grown in the 
United States surpass the Kherson in 
economic importance or in potential 
value. It is one of the most widely 
distributed early varieties, especially 
in the Corn Belt and the central section 
of the Great Plains area. The exten¬ 
sive distribution of Kherson and Sixty- 
105), and States Pride (Wisconsin No. 
7) are added to those of the original 
variety, this type of oat easily ranks 
third in importance in the United 
States, being exceeded only by Silver- 
mine and Red Rustproof. 
REVIEW OF LITERATURE 
Carleton (2, S) z , Lyon {15), War- 
burton {2 If), and Warburton and 
Fig. 1 . —Outline map of the United States, showing the distribution of Kherson (Sixty-Day) oat 
in 1919 
Day oats in the United States in 1919 
is shown by the map (fig. 1) prepared 
from statistics obtained in an oat 
varietal survey conducted by the 
Office of Cereal Investigations in co¬ 
operation with the then Bureau of 
Crop Estimates. Among the 10 lead¬ 
ing varieties in 1919, Kherson and 
Sixtv-Day ranked fourth in acreage. 
When the acreages of important selec¬ 
tions such as Albion (Iowa No. 103), 
Iowar, Gopher, Richland (Iowa No. 
Stanton (26) have presented historical 
accounts of the introduction of the 
Kherson and Sixty-Day into the United 
States. All of the foregoing writers, 
and also Etheridge (5), have classified 
Kherson as belonging to Arena sativa 
and have published general or botanical 
descriptions of the variety. Warbur¬ 
ton and Stanton (26) state that “bo- 
tanically the Kherson and Sixty-Day 
oats can not be distinguished one from 
the other, * * * the varieties are 
1 Received for publication Aug. 25, 1924; issued August, 1925. 
2 The authors wish to acknowledge their indebtedness to C. R. Ball, senior agronomist, and C. W. War- 
burton, formerly agronomist, of the Office of Cereal Investigations, for assistance in the preparation of the 
manuscript. 
3 Reference is made by number (italic) to “ Literature cited,” p. 1081. 
Journal of Agricultural Research, 
Washington, D. C. 
( 1063 ) 
Vol. XXX, No. 11 
June 1, 1925 
Key No. G-401 
