The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-03-21
TESTING SEEDS AT
 EXPERIMENT STATION
WORK OF GREAT VALUE TO
 FARMERS BEING DONE.

L. How Adulterations of Grass and Glow CT Seeds Are Detected-Interest- ing Experiments By Miss Mary dagger.
 Testing seeds at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, is a | new work at the station. Dr. E. H. Jenkins, the director, was the first in this country to take up the testing of seeds, in which he became interest ed when in Germany. The work is in charge of Miss Mary H. Jagger.
 How did you happen to take this work up?" Miss dagger was asked. Why, on finishing high school, left word with the principal to let me know if he heard of anything I could do. Dr. Jenkins sent there to see if for this work. I was recommended and took the job. Now I am very enthusiastic over it. The station sent me to Washington, D. C., where most has been done in this line. There are 14 Or 15 girls working there in this line. Since January 1908. we have been testing seeds here. Come and see my germinating seeds.
 Here are onion seeds. These have been in a day and are just sprouttng. You put them between two layers of damp plotting paper and keep them at 6S degrees for IS hours of the 25 and about 86 degrees for the other 6 hours. Other seeds. especially clovers, you want to keep about 68 degrees all the time. Timothy and red top seeds, these are so small that I do not put a piece of plotting over them.''
 What is the gain of seed testing?" Miss Jagger was asked.
 
 CT and grass seeds or any kind of vegetable and find out about how great a proportion of the seds Will grow. Grass seed and red clover Is sometimes much adulterated with the seeds of different weeds, which grow away much of the value of the newly seeded piece We test for weed seeds. There are many kinds of weed seeds. Nof if a farmer about to seed down piece of land would send to the sta- tion a package of the seed he was thinking of buying we could tell him the proportion of the grass seed, clover seed weed seed, etc. and also the vii tality of the grass seed, that is about how much of it would come up.
 See the seed in this little bottle. That is good clover seed. The label 93.5 per cent, real value of the sam pie 92.5. No dodder.' Now dodder is a parasite that grows on clover, mats it together so that it cannot be properly cured. The seed of this weed sends up a thread like stem, yellow or red dish in color, which at once gets on to a clover stem When once nicely settled on clover stalk, the dodder casts off in connection with the ground, and lives entirely off the clov- CT. The dodder seeds abundantly and so leaves plenty for the next clover crop
 ssDodder seed is about the size of clover seed and hard to be taken for rounded bits of soil. The field dodder Is common in this country. We have found dodder seed in the greater part of the samples of clover seed ex- amined here.
 'In this bottle, red clover seed is adulterated with black medic seed. This is a weed of no value. Clover and medic seed are much the same in color and size. This weed seed is actually imported from Germany in large quantities on purpose to mix with clover seed
 Here in this bottle, the red clover seed has lot of plantain seed with it To every pound of the clover seed, there are 16.435 seeds of plantain.
 "Every pound of this clover here has 11,615 dodder seeds to the pound. While clover is generally pure, clean seed. Alfalfa and orchard grass are more often adulterated.
 Here are two samples of Timothy, Of one. only ? per cent will grow, very poor. and of the other 95.7 per cent very good seed Compare these two samples of red top Of one 752 per cent will grow, at least and of the other 17.7 per cent. This one here has ground quartz mixed with it''
 "Do the farmers take advantage of this free opportunity to find out about seed?"
 "Yes, there is a growing demand. CTS and grasses were sent in. Dur ing the winter more vegetable seeds come in.''
 There is a collection of 1900 kinds of seeds in this department. 800 of which were. collected in Germany. 800 sent from Washington and the rest collected around New Haven. Miss dagger has collected over 100 around the grounds of the station.
 Tn the collection of weed seeds are found many old friends, more familiar a. they grow in the fields and woods. of plaintain, dock, sorre1 bind weed, self-heal lambs quarters, tumble week. chickweeds, wild carrot chicory, ragweed, dodder, rib grass, mustards and charlock.
 About two-thirds of the clover seed grown in this country comes from In- diana Ohio and Illinois. Indiana lead ing with one-third of the total clover seed raised in the United States Other clover bearing seed states are Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Missouri, Kansas and Utah. The source of the greater part of the weed seeds in clover is in what is irn- ported. "a cheap and dirty seed" Can ada prohibits the sale within her bor- ders of seed containing weed seed but provides for it's export
 Tn buying clover seed. the farmer should get only such seed as "the wholesaler will guarantee to be free from dodder, to have a sprouting pow CT of 85 per cent and purity of 95 per cent" There is pure clover seed on the market. By having his clover seed tested at the station, the farmer will find a pure seed in the end
 To select a sample for examination be sure that it represents as accur- ately as possible the quality of the whole amount of seed The directions given by the station for getting good sample to test are these: "Mix well together with the hand and arm the contents of the bag or barrel of seed. Then take out five or six small cupfuls from various parts of the package. mix these carefully together, and take a part of this mixture for the sample. Send at least ounces of small seeds, as grasses. ounces of red clover and of wheat and cereals, ounces.
 Good clover seed should weigh about