The Grit-advocate., 1905-03-17
THE FARM AND RANGE
Wheat Without Irritation.

Il
conducting a series Of experiments in
wheat raising. His experiments have
proven the adaptability of grains TO
conditions prevailing in the dryer por-
tions OF Colorado and have attracted
the interest of the Department of Agri-
culture at Washington. The ground
chosen for this purpose lies near the
Orphans Home, at the corner of Colo
rado boulevard and Colfax avenue, and
is at such an elevation with reference
10 Its surroundings that it is impossi-
BILE for it to catch seepage water, and
the only moisture coming to the
ground is the natural precipitation
from rain and snow.
MI. Gauss has worked upon the the
ory that wheat, which is a native of a
Gry country could. by means of giving
] proper attention to tillage, using seed
from his own crop and making sure
that his seed was clean-that is, all
taken from his experimental farm
be made in time to produce a profit
able crop of good grade wheat. Ever
since 1886 he has persevered. Mr..
|
the problem. but he gives the results
of last years harvest, which certainly
show very decided improvement
over his first efforts.
| In his experiments Mr. Gauss
planted one-half acre in each of mac
aroni wheat, rain belt wheat and i'm
proved Fife wheat 1t was the latter
wheat that he endeavored to develop
and this was sown in the middle piece
Of ground SO as to bring it as nearly
as possible to the conditions prevail
ing in the other patches.
The harvest last year resulted as fol-
lows: Fife $50 sheaves, macaroni 136
sheaves. rain belt 1872 sheaves. When
threshed the Fife Wheat showed a
yield of almost sixteen bushels to the
acre. The other wheats yielded from
one to three bushels less per acre, the
I nacaroni wheat being next to the Fife
| m yield. This is considerably above
The average yield per acre throughout
| The United States
| Experiments have been made with
| rye, barley. oats and five different
| kinds of wheat sent Mr.. Gauss by the
Department of Agriculture. Rye and
| barley show wonderful adaptability to
conditions prevailing here Rye espe-
rially will make an excellent grain for
| eastern Colorado. For the purpose of
being able to rotate crops experiments
| have been made with Turkestan al
| fala and it has been clearly demon
| strated that it will grow without irri-
| cation.
The raising Of sugar beets having
made rapid strides in Colorado dur
| ing the past three years, Mr.. Gauss
| is now experimenting with that crop.
| The sugar beet is biennial, so that
| when raised from seed it will not yield
seed until the second year. The first
| seed was sown last year; the plants
| secured from this seed will be re-
| planted this spring and next fall the
| first seed resulting from the expert
ment will be harvested. These. in
turn, will be sown and so on until the
| adaptibility of the sugar beet shall be
determined.
1t is Mr. Gauss intention to distrib-
ute seed wheat successfully grown by
him among number Of farmers. This
wheat will be sown and the crops har-
vested separately and the crop used
for sowing a larger acreage the fol-
| lowing year, and SO on until. if de-
sired. the farmers will be able to raise
this wheat entirely for their crops.
These experiments have been con-
! Quoted by Mr.. Gauss entirely at his
| own expense, and in the face Of con-
| siderable discouragement at the start.
| The first years crop returned but lit
| tie more than the seed sown. but was
grown entirely without irrigation. In
| 1898, 1S99 1900 and 1901 crops were
grown, enough seed being saved each
year to replant in case a crop should
, be destroyed. In one instance this
| was fortunate as the entire crop was
| ruined by rabbits, ground squirrels
and other prairie vermin.
In February, 1902. the late Fred
Bond state engineer of Wyoming, Sc
| cured one pint Of seed grown by Mr.
Gauss in 1901, half of which he
planted at Cheyenne, at an altitude of
| G,050 feet above sea level During the
| growing season this was subjected to
two severe storms. the second of
! which broke the vegetation down COM
| pletely; later it was partially de-
stroyed and carried away by ground
squirrels. but when threshed yielded
nine and one-half pints Or nineteen
fold. The other half pint was planted
near Buffalo. Johnson county. northern
Wyoming. at an altitude of 400 feet.
This field met with no disaster and
when harvested yielded twenty-one
and one-half pints or forty-three fold.
Acclmatization of wheat as practiced
| in these experiments is distinctly diff
| different from naturalization, the De-
partment of Agriculture has devoted
| a great deal of attention to this lat
ter important work, which is the intro
duction of plants from other parts of
the world presumed to be already
adapted to the conditions where re-
planted. Acclimatization is the process
by which nature changes the plant to
adapt it to new conditions of soil, eli
mate, latitude, altitude, moisture and
other elements. This is done by breed
ing, selecting seed of the strongest
L l,a a1tira nparnSt