Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1907-12-25
Selecting Seed Potatoes.


That Improvement Of plants and ami
mails may be accomplished by selec-
ton of the parent stock has become a
generally accepted theory. Some spe-
cies of the domestic animals have,
after several centuries of selection
been bred to almost a perfect type
Within the last few years a great
work has been done along the line OF
improvement of plants by selection,
especially corn and the other cereals,
says the Mirror and Farmer. Pr
baby less work has been done to-
ward improving the potato than with
any of our other great food plants
Yet enough has been accomplished to
prove that no plant can be more
quickly improved both In quality and
yield than the potato.
1t has been a common practice in
the eastern states, and to a certain
extent in the West. among those who
grow potatoes for family use, to plant
only the small potatoes and culls that
are left in the spring after the supply
for the house has been picked out.
This is, of course, the worst possible
kind of selection, and always results
in degeneration, or what is known as
running OUT of the stock. Because
OF this varieties of one generation are
unknown in the next. On the other
hand, there are localities where the
same variety of potatoes has been
O.. ~ Loo fu
better and more productive now than
when introduced.
Commercial growers have not made
this mistake to so great an extent, but
have generally made a practice of Sc
lecting a good type and a medium size
of tuber from the bins during the win
ter for the following seed crop. In
this way some good seed is planted
but for several reasons a large per
cent is poor seed. A potato tuber is
not a seed, but a part of the plant
from which it came, consequently the
characteristics of the parent plant
are more sure to be reproduced in
the new plant than in plants that are
grown from seed that ara the union of
/ two parent plants. A little observar
ton in the field when digging will
show that there is great variation in
the different hills Of pot ltoes on a
given area. One plant may have 10
or IL good sized, smooth marketable
potatoes. The next may have one
good potato with three or four small
or inferior potatoes or possibly a Hill
many have but two medium sized pota-
toes Of the same type as the first hill.
Now, if the selection is made in the
cellar about as many of the seed POI
tatoes will come from poor hills as
from good, and the result will be to
produce more poor hills, and this
carried on from year to year tends to
decrease the yield of potatoes.
The best way to select Is to take
only good potatoes from hills that
produce nothing but good potatoes,
and goodly rumber of them. This
work may be done by digging them
by hand, but so many hills have to be
discarded that it makes the work
slow and expensive. If the potatoes
cling to the vines, the selection can be
made by following the digger. Tie sys-
tenn used by the Colorado agricultural
experiment tsation is to pillow out the
rows with a common mold-board plow.
This leaves the potatoes on the vines
with most of the tubers exposed on
the surface of the turned furrow. Not
more than 10 per cent Of the hills will
be suitable 20 select from the first
year. but Ihese planted ought to pro
duce much higher grade Of potatoes
from which to select the next year.