Page 2 
HARVEST NUMBER 
“G” Hybrid Seed 
Demand Skyrockets 
For 1941 Planting 
Performance Under Unfavorable 
1940 Season: Growing Use of 
Hybrid Over Country, Make Early 
Orders Advisable 
Remember the hectic scramble for hy¬ 
brid corn seed that resulted from its 
sudden popularity in the middle thirties 
and continued until seed producers caught 
up with the demand in the last few 
years? 
Because the hybrid industry under favor¬ 
able crop years has been able to increase 
seed production to meet this increased 
demand, many farmers have mistakenly 
assumed that from now on there will 
always be plenty of seed available. 
Frankly, we hope this is the case. In 
planning 1940 seed production with 
Associate Growers, President “Gene” 
Funk warned all members of the organ¬ 
ization that “Today more than ever we 
recognize our obligation because our 
thousands of farmer friends are count¬ 
ing on us to produce the hybrid that is 
best adapted to their farm.” Under this 
far sighted policy more than 50,000 new 
customers are growing corn from Funk 
and Associate Growers; and “G” Hybrids 
this year were planted on over 2,000,000 
acres of farm land. 
Warn of Seed Shortage 
Remember, unfavorable corn growing 
seasons like the present one made the 
hybrid industry. The Corn Belt Farm 
Dailies, in a recent editorial warned 
readers, “Those wanting hybrid seed 
better get busy, by all reports, for there 
won’t be enough to go around. The late¬ 
comers will get caught short.” 
In support of this contention, the paper 
cites the increase in hybrid corn acreage 
in Iowa this season to 88 percent of the 
state corn acreage compared with 74 per¬ 
cent last year. Similar increases have 
taken place in other states and the hy¬ 
brid percentages below show there is 
still plenty of room for expansion of 
demand, especially when we consider 
that many Illinois and Iowa counties are 
growing over 95% hybrid. Following is 
the percentage by states for 1940: 
Iowa .88% 
Illinois .77% 
Indiana .66% 
Ohio .57% 
Minnesota .54% 
Wisconsin .51% 
Missouri .28% 
Nebraska .23% 
South Dakota .12° /o 
Kansas . 8% 
More than half of the total corn belt 
acreage is in hybrid now. But there’s 
ground for a lot of seed in the othei 
half. Hybrid acreage in the Eastern and 
Southern states has just this season be¬ 
gan an expansion that may be quite as 
fast a changeover as the cornbelt has 
undergone but which, of course, will be 
less dramatic because of the relatively 
smaller acreage involved. 
Performance Ups Demand 
For example, the whole south last year 
raised only a little more corn than did 
the cornbelt state of Iowa alone. As corn- 
belt farmers do not sell their crop to 
the South anyway, most of them wel¬ 
come the contribution hybrids are mak¬ 
ing toward more and better feed loi 
subsistence living on southern farms. 
Sales of “G” Hybrids, to date are more 
than three times last year’s figures. This 
increase is due mainly to the conditions 
of the 1940 season which brought out 
the superiority of ‘Weatherproofed’’ 
Funk Strains. Away to a fast start, G 
Hybrid fields escaped most of the re¬ 
planting troubles from the cold wet 
spring Fewer than one Funk planted 
field per 1000, by actual seed replace¬ 
ment records, was replanted. When the 
summer drought hit, Funk strains, 
“Bred to Beat the Elements” and tried, 
not only through droughts of earlier 
years but in the interim through drought 
plantings in the Western and Southern 
Corn Belt, proved ready for the chal - 
enge. Preliminary yields from our plots 
indicate that these strains will register 
the greatest percentage increase over 
both open-pollinated and competitive 
hybrids in history. 
IT S. corn production outlook for Octo¬ 
ber 1940 was for 2,352,185,000 bu. as 
against 2,619,137.000 last year. The 
average vield of 27.2 but. per acre com¬ 
pares with 29.5 bu. in 1939. Greatest 
decrease in yield is in the central corn- 
belt; Illinois for example has an aver¬ 
age yield of 41 bu. per acre compared 
with 52 bu. last year. 
This Proving Plot at Sioux Falls, South Dakota is just one outpost of Funk's far-flung system of more 
than 2,500 plots where "G" Hybrid performance is measured from the Atlantic Coast to the Rockies 
each season. 
| NATION-WIDE TRIAL PLOT PROGRAM PROVES ‘G’ HYBRIDS 
SIX ‘TRU-DR0P’ GRADES 
Small Flat Regular Flat Large Flat 
Small Round Regular Round Large Round 
Save With Round Kernels 
(Continued lrom page 1) 
the respective grades, so that the farmer 
who purchases the seed can plant the 
same accurately in any modern corn 
planter. 
A tribute should be paid to the manu¬ 
facturers of corn planters serving the 
corn belt area because they have devised 
very successful equipment for planting 
round kernels. In fact a modern corn 
planter with proper plates will plant 
practically any size or shape of seed 
if it is graded uniformly. All of this is 
just another way of saying that the 
large percentage of round kernel hybrid 
seed which will be produced this year 
will not be a loss to the industry or to 
the farmer who will necessarily need to 
use it, as it is rather generally accepted 
that there will not be enough flat kernel 
hybrid seed to take care of the demand 
for 1941. 
Dr. J. R. Holbert, Plant Breeder for 
Funk Bros. Seed Company, is authority 
for the statement that no other single 
phase of corn growing has been as 
thoroughly tested under every conceiv¬ 
able condition as has the value of 
different sizes and shapes of kernel. He 
reports that more than 600 official ex¬ 
periments are on file in the library at 
Washington, D. C., where size and shape 
of kernel have been tested to see 
whether or not there is any difference 
in the yielding ability of round kernel 
hybrid seed as compared with the flat 
kernel types. A summary of these ex¬ 
tensive experiments brings only one 
conclusion, and that it that there is no 
difference in the ability of round or flat 
kernels to produce a good crop for the 
farmer who uses them. 
Germ Plasm is Identical 
The germ plasm which represents the 
characteristics which have been bred into 
a specific hybrid is of course identical in 
the round kernels and the flat kernels. 
The only difference is in the shape of the 
container for the germ which is the 
kernel itself. The fact that the starch 
around the germ is round or square in¬ 
stead of flat does not make any difference. 
The very fact that this is true is going 
to enable a lot of farmers to have good 
quality hybrid seed to plant next spring 
in spite of the handicaps which the in¬ 
dustry has had to meet during the 
growing season. This assumption is, of 
course, based on the idea that no further 
damage will result in further depleted 
supplies. . , 
There are those folks in the industry who 
feel that there will not be enough good 
quality hybrid seed corn to go around 
this year. Whether or not this is true 
will depend on how generally farmers in 
the marginal corn growing territory 
accept hybrids this season. If there 1 ^ 
any substantial increase in the use of 
hybrid corn in territory where this type 
of seed has not been previously used, it 
is quite possible that there might not be 
enough good seed to go around. This 
remains to be seen, however. 
CUT HARVEST COSTS 
(Continued from page 1) 
hybrid he has ever competed in for big 
ears, clean snapping, standability and 
convenient ear placement, trained for 
his contest appearances with 80 minute 
sprints in the Funk fields on his Foun¬ 
tain County Farm. In each contest he 
entered he went into the contest knowing 
that he had picked faster in training 
than during the preceding year. ..an 
increase he attributes mainly to improved 
picking fields. 
Millard Harp, a Sangamon county, Illi¬ 
nois. corn husker was so impressed with 
the picking qualities of “G” Hybrids that 
last year he kept records of his work on 
the Otto Frey farm. “I shucked 7,026 
bu. of Funk’s ‘G’ Hybrids last fall in 
50 days of nine hours each. My biggest 
day was 164 bushels,” Frey reports. Frey 
hauled all corn two miles to the elevator 
and did his regular chores every day. 
Nor has the hand husker missed entirely 
the greater efficiency of machines and 
corns that made mechanical picking gain 
so rapidly in popularity. For example, 
in 1928 and 1929 the Illinois Agricultural 
Engineering Department found hand 
huskers leaving 2.8 bu. per acre in fields. 
Last fall in Central Illinois hybrid fields 
the U.S.D.A. found only 1.7 bu. per acre 
ear and shelled gleanings left by hand 
huskers. Further, hand pickers using 
rubber tired wagons are able to haul 
bigger loads, waste less time in driving 
to and from crib and with modern eleva¬ 
tors, unload their corn in less than half 
the time. 
Husking Speeds 
To husk an acre of corn requires 
approximately 2.50 miles of travel with 
a one-row picker; 1.25 miles with a two- 
row machine. The greater the speed the 
more corn can be harvested. In strong- 
stalked “G” Hybrids, regardless of how 
high the yield, customers report they 
consistently run their tractors with 
pneumatic tires at 5 miles per hour. The 
Iowa Corn Research Institute last fall 
tested speeds of 3, 3.6 and 5 miles per 
hour in corn yielding 90 bu. per acre. 
There was practically no difference in 
field losses. 
Larger Capacity Wagons 
Another way to save labor and time, the 
Institute found, is to use larger capacity 
wagons. Two 40 bushel wagons were re¬ 
built to hold 70 bushels. One man with the 
two 70 bushel wagons could harvest and 
crib 60 bushel corn with a total labor 
expenditure of .6 man hours per acre. 
This was 25 percent less than the .8 
man hours used with three 40 bushel 
wagons. Carl O. Johnson, Marshall 
County, Illinois Funk’s “G” Hybrid raiser 
who had the highest machinery efficiency 
index in the Illinois Farm Management 
Service last year, uses flare-top wagons 
of large capacity to husk into. He has 
no horses but uses a second small tractor 
to haul wagons from the field and at the 
crib uses the power-take-off of this light 
tractor to elevate the corn. 
Handling Heavy Corn 
Farm equipment manufacturers have 
almost doubled the capacity of their 
picker rollers, either by adding to length 
or number of rollers, to give their 
machines capacity to take care of larger 
hybrid yields. Despite this, there is no 
question that in years like 1938 and 1939, 
“G” Hybrids are likely to tax picker 
capacities. One solution suggested by 
the Iowa Corn Research Institute is to 
plant for higher yields by decreasing 
row spacing rather than by increasing 
kernels per hill. After removing half the 
stand from 90 bushel corn the institute 
found that corn left in the field dropped 
from 7.6 percent in the full stand to 1 
percent in the half stand. 
Estimate-Don’t Guess 
On Your 1940 Crop of 
Funk’s “G” Hybrids 
Here are Rules to Make Accurate 
Check of Corn Yields on Your Farm: 
Tests Prove Farmers Poor Guessers 
Sure, we all like to speculate on corn 
yields. But the plain facts are that few 
if any farmers have the ability to guess 
yields by appearance accurately enough 
to detect those small but yet profitable 
yield increases that result from use of 
better “G” Hybrid strains or recom¬ 
mended crop practices. 
Most Guesses Inaccurate 
Especially is this true in hybrids where 
plant characteristics throw you off. In 
Funk strains, for example, because the 
big ears fill the husks completely and 
are held close to the stalk on short, 
strong shanks, there often appears less 
corn in the field then in a competitive 
hybrid with long shanks and loose husks. 
But when it’s husked out, what a differ¬ 
ence! Even our testing crews who har¬ 
vest thousands of trial plots each fall, 
cannot often rank the strains until they 
have totaled the weights. At the Illinois 
cornhusking contest last year more than 
half the farmers in a yield guessing 
contest missed by nine bushels or more 
per acre and the average guess was 5.8 
bu. below the actual yield of 94.36 bu. 
per acre. In 1939 Illinois Farm Manage¬ 
ment cooperators guessed their own yields 
low by 16%. 
For these reasons we urge you to either 
make an estimate using the procedures 
below, or if you prefer, ask your local 
“G” Hybrid representative to take a yield 
check of your corn. These tests are 
reasonably accurate and will probably 
change your opinions in regard to many 
strains in your fields. 
In the farm management survey, ran¬ 
dom samples made in this way were 
within 8 percent in all 20 fields and the 
average was only one-half percent below 
harvested yield. 
How To Estimate Yields 
To estimate yield of a field of corn pick 
and weigh all corn from 25 consecutive 
hills in four representative locations. 
Multiply weight of corn from these 100 
hills (in lbs.) by correct factor below. 
Results is yield in bushels per acre. 
Row Spacing 70 lb. Basis 80 lb. Basis 
3 it., 4 in. x 3 ft., 4 in. .56 :49 
3 ft., 4 in. x 3 ft., 6 in. .533 ;467 
3 ft., 6 in. x 3 ft., 6 in. .503 .445 
Drilled Corn 
Take the weight of corn husked from the 
proper distance (see table below) multi¬ 
ply by 100 and divide by the estimated 
number of pounds per bushel depending 
on the moisture in the corn. 
Rows 3 ft., 6 in. apart pick 124 feet and 
multiply by 100. 
Rows 3 ft., 4 in. apart pick 131 feet and 
multiply by 100. 
Rows 3 ft., 2 in. apart pick 137 feet and 
multiply by 100. 
To get shelling percentage, shell 25 
pounds of your corn samples. Divide the 
weight of shelled corn by 25 to get shell¬ 
ing percentage. 
Nelson P. Jones (riaht) and Lloyd Skelton. 
Ind. Funk Representative in *'G" Hybrid field 
that made 168 bu. official yield from round 
kernels. 
Rounds Produce 168 Bu. Crop 
Nelson P. Jones of Whiteland, Indiana 
chalked up one of the highest yields of 
corn in 1939 that has ever been recorded 
in the officially checked yield records of 
the Corn Belt. His yield of more than 
168 bushels per acre in the Indiana 5- 
Acre Corn Yield Contest was produced 
with large round kernel G-135. 
Thousands of farmers have learned that 
round kernels are not only a good “buy” 
but that they produce splendid crops of 
corn equal to that produced by any other 
grade of seed. The experience of Mr. 
Nelson P. Jones indicates that these 
grades can be successfully used. 
