A foreword to our 
1954 Catalogue 
Comments are based on our own growing experience—you may not 
agree with us, but we are reporting as we saw things—no axes to grind 
—no friends to favor. 
Three test gardens close by helped us shape our opinions for they 
had the same growing conditions as we did. 
A hot dry season, with ten days in August with over 90° each day. 
Straw mulch and an irrigation system were lifesavers. 
While you may not agree with us on all our comments, we have 
tried to be fair to each variety. Certainly, they have all had the same 
care, they were all grown under the same conditions, and,some just 
were better than others. Varieties that did not perform too well will 
be tried another year, as it sometimes takes a year’s growing to get 
the best results. 
There were a large number of varieties under test in the test 
gardens close by. This enabled us to check our results with the test 
gardens, and also let us get a peek at some of the good ones to come. 
We would recommend highly, that you send your best seedlings to 
test gardens for trial. Scattered around the country as they are, you 
get a chance to find out, before introduction, how well your glad will 
grow in foreign soils. Test gardens are worth while and it is just too 
bad that everyone cannot have a test garden close by. 
The hot dry weather had its effect throughout the state. Spikes at 
all the shows were off quality, mostly fewer buds and shorter spikes. 
If a glad stood up to our August heat, it would probably do well any- 
where—and some of them can really take it. More comments about 
them as you get back to descriptions. 
The straw mulch again saved us and was worth the time and money 
it cost. For a small home garden where two or three bales will cover, 
it is an investment that will repay itself without question. It may not 
look quite as nice as plain soil, nicely cultivated, but it will produce 
better, nicer, and larger spikes. It’s true, the wheat or oats will grow 
up in the rows, but with a small garden, that’s not hard to control. 
It may be hard to turn under in the fall or next spring, but come next 
summer, you will have a lot of extra humus in your soil. Actually, in 
two or three years of doing this, you would hardly recognize the same 
soil. Your ‘soil is cooler, you need less water, and you get much better 
growth. We recommend it. 
An irrigation system is a life saver and we are fortunate enough to 
have water to supply one. A couple of springs help form a little pond 
from which we pump our water. A Skinner overhead system does the 
rest. Some extra cost, of course, but worth it. You can start with a 
hand-turn and then graduate into automatic without too much cost. 
