The Wisconsin tobacco reporter. (Edgerton, Wis.) 1877-1950, 1906-03-23
NOTE BOOK SKETCHES


Singular as it may seem, the records
| of the packing houses show that the
1905 crop is running more largely to the
filler grades than any previous crop in
some years A great many crops are re-
ceived from growers 25 per cent. filters
and even then the grades are not entire
ly free from them. Warehouse men re-
port anywhere from 3 to 5 per cent.
shrinkage of filters taken out when the
tobacco is running over the sorting
tables. This last item means 80 cent
loss to the packers upon each hundred
of tobacco handled. The grower has re-
ceived wrapper and binder price for this
leaf which properly belonged in the
filler grades. One packer figures this
item alone amounts to over 500 week
in single warehouse and in his seasons
packing reached several thousand dol
lars-all for tobacco bought at filler
price but delivered and paid for at about
five times the agreed figure. 1t is not to
be expected that any crop will be strip
ped entirely free from an occasional filler
leaf but the record of the season seems
to show that the higher the price of to-
bacco, the more careless the grower be-
comes regarding separating the grades.
When tobacco was cheap 10 per cent.
was considered fair percentage of
shrinkage in warehouse handling. Why
should this percentage douEle up when
prices advance?
*x*
The big tobacco trust is surely
money maker. The annual report for
the American Tobacco Co. for the year
ending Dec. 31st last, including all it's
subsidiary concerns, shows net earning
Of $25,212,284, which is an increase of
nearly three million dollars over that of
a year ago. The company paid its inter
est charges the usual dividends and an
extra 10 per cent. besides. It also pur-
chased and retired bonds to the amount
of Sl2070,084 during the year which de-
creased the profit and loss account near
ly four millions, but few million more
or less doesn't matter, the company is
doing. SO we'll. The company claims as
sets of 274 millions and outstanding 79
millions of preferred, 40 millions of COM
mon stock, and owes So millions of 6 per
cent. and So millions of per cent. gold
bonds. It's total liabilities amount to
S248 .675,O99. Next to the steel trust, the
American Tobacco Co. is one of the larg-
est industrial corporations in the country.
~
HOW MUCH TOBACCO SEED TO SOW.
Tobacco seeds are extremely small and
an ounce of them contains from 100000
to 100000 seeds. A large percentage Of
these, however, will not sprout Some
| of them are not fertile, and others have
very hard coating, too resistant to
moisture. On this subject Prof. S. W.
johnson, in How Crops Grow" says:
| Among the seeds of various plants
! clover, for example-which under favor
able circumstances mostly germinate
within one or two weeks, may often be
found a number which remain unchang-
! cd, sound and dry within for months and
years, though constantly wet externally.
The outer coat of these seeds is eXcep-
tionally thick, dense and resistant to
| moisture. x * x In collection of
such seeds kept in water individuals
sprout from time to time. In case of
common sorrel it was found that 10 per
cent of the seed terminated between the
four hundredth and five hundredth day
after putting in the sprouting apparatus.
After careful experiments it is pretty
we'll established that not more than Is
per cent of the most carefully grown to-
bacco seed will germinate, while very
! much less than this will, under ordinary
circumstances, be available for planting.
Allowing, however, for the imperfections
in the seed, and for the too deep and the
too shallow planting and for loss by &C
cident, there ought to be at least $4,000
J seeds or plants from an ounce of fresh
| tobacco seed. It must be remembered,
however, that many of these plants will
be weak, and some of them will be re-
tarded by the more vigorous plants.
They will not therefore be of uniform
size and ready to transplant at the same
time. AS the grower usually plants the
field at a single planting he can not wait
for the backward plants to grow. Ex-
perienced planters therefore usually SOW
at least three times the amount of seed
that they expect to need in order to pro-
vide themselves with sufficient plants
| when the time comes for setting them
out A bed 3 by so feet, producing from
10000 to 10000 plants in the aggregate,
can be used for sowing about one-third
of an ounce of good fresh seed, but it is
safer to SOW three such beds for this
number of plants. By having an abun
dance of plants one gots the additional
advantage of having large percentage
of forward thrifty plants. Before sow
ing the tobacco seed it is we'll to test the
terminating power. Sometimes the
seeds are put on hot stove, when the
sterile seeds will quietly char and the
vital seeds will pop. This test can not
be relled upon, but real terminating
test should be made. To do this, take
100 seeds carefully counted out, place
them between two wet blotters, put
these between two china plates 50 they
.o& n1 IN