The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1904-04-16
Novelties in Wheat and Corn

Priscilla Leonard In Youths Companion
Not verv long ago Sir William Crookes,
president Of the British Association, asserted
eIaomilv that by 1881 the world would not
produce enough wheat to 20 around His ar
gumeui vas that there is Just so much wheat
land upon the globe, and that the wheat eat.
ing races are increasing beyond the limit OF
future supply. Bat Sir William forgot the IN
ventiyeness Of the Yankee; and the American
editor who responded that ii u steady price OF
a dollar q bushel was guaranteed America
would take the con,rGct to supply what wss
needed was no, far wrong. The wheat lands
may BIZ limited, but the future possibilities OF
wheat Itself are also TO be reckoned with.
Man has been raising wheat for uneOunied
ages. aud corn for centuries; yet the grains
themselves have changed very little under
cultivation since our first record OF them. But
toda1 chemistry and biology have taken a turn
toward agriculture, and wheat ia Minnesota
and corn ia Illinois have been the subjects of
marvellous aud successful experiment.
Ten years ago, for instance, the Minnesota
State Experiment Station took up the idea ct
producing new wheAtS- Il Is, IN the begin
ming, a French idea. Mons. Henri Nilmoriu
having done some tiue experimenting.
The American workers have already pro
duced some startling results. They began by
AFkEHGtAllh GEN~N. .bEtfu4iiN hAIltNA MhNo'H- ~
DO this We are told the experimenters went
into the blossoming wheat at four o clock IN
the morning. transferred the pollen Of one
sort to the flowers Of another. tied the heads
so treated in tiny bags of tissue. TO keep out
insects or birds, and marked them with record
tags Nhen these heads of wheat matured
the seed grains were harvested, registered and
planted by themselves.
Some OF these infinitesimal crops turned out
poorly. some eucouragingly. Out OF the nun
dreds of wheatS thus bred some eight or ten
showed marked advance. These were sowed
and reaped until there was enough seed TO
give out to farmers to use III open ''held trl
ais"
ttakes about ten years of patient work to
bring each new variety TO this farm test
But the results Justify the labor. In most cases
these new wheatS Welded at least two bushels
more TO the acre than the standard wheat, and
were vigorous aud healthy. In one case,
where the average yield was fifteen bushels,
the new Minnesota Number l63' yielded
fortytwo bushes-a result which ought to
cheer Sir William Crookes's heart.
Meanwhile, in Illinois, the Agricultural
College at Urbana has been working away on
corn. bv selection and careful breeding. The
Illinois eNperimeuters, as one report puts II,
have been ''outwitting and reforming nature.
They have aimed. not only at increasing the
WELD. but at controlling the elements of the
kernel itself They have succeeded in grow
ing corn with less or more oil, or less or more
protein, at will.
Corn oil is so important an element that one
manufacturer has offered FIVE cents a bushel
more for every extra one per cent. of oil IN
the corn. Over one per cent. has already
been added, and further advance is looked
for; while FIVE per cent. Of protein has been
added to another variety.
A ''corn register is now established IN H.
Enois, where the pedigrees of the different
new varieties are registered precisely as pedl,
greed animals are recorded. An increase OF
fen bushels an acre is prophesied-which
would mean fifty million dollars more for H.
linos on her yearly corn crop, just as Mime
apolis and the Dakolas, with the new wheat
can hope for twenty two millions more annu-
ally.
1t all sounds like fairy tale. But 1t has
been done step by step, with almost incredible
painstaking; and it is no more marvellous, al
ter all. than the development of an Amer
can Beauty from the original wild rose.
Who knows what wonderful wheats the TWEEN
ty. first century may see? If the farmers boy
of today finds the farm outlook stupid, the
dulness must be more in himself than IN the
possibilities of agriculture.