Heppner gazette. [volume] (Heppner, Morrow County, Or.) 1892-1912, 1911-04-20
sEEDTlME AND HARVEST.

l. "
College, Corvallis.
: With such wonderful weather TO
, the earliest plowing and seeding a.
! only Oregon can offer-every sowe
| of seeds is already looking forwarC
2 with the highest expectations to I
: most prosperous harvest.
But just moment, friend Yor
remember well the scriptural warning
Whatsoever man soweth, thai
shall he also reap" No prohecy ever
uttered, perhaps, has received so uni.
versal acceptance from humanity in
all the ages as this, possibly because
it is founded upon a most primal lit
eral truth.
From remote times man has been
first of all sower of seed and every
recurring harvest in its dearth or in
its plenitude has driven home the un-
alterable truth of this maxim. Yet
the farmer Of today, who of all men
should give most heed to the literal
accuracy of this text and its direct ap-
plication to his industry seems often
more needless of this first step toward
a bountiful harvest than were his fore
bears ages ago.
For failure because of carelessness
in the quality of the seed used, there
seems little excuse nowadays. If
scientific agriculture" has done
aught it has first of all increased the
farmers opportunity to secure crops
of the highest quality, and repeatedly
it has emphasized the need of so doing.
Everywhere the state experiment
stations and the federal agricultural
authorities have eagerly extended the
helping hand to aid the farmer in pro-
curing good seed, and year after year
has the wisdom Of these efforts been
amply demonstrated.
The farmer of Oregon seems less
progressive in this matter than those
of any other section of the country.
Out of all of the samples of seed re-
ceived and tested at the cooperative
seed testing laboratory at Corvallis
last year only twenty per cent were
sent in by Oregon farmers. Yet the
need for most careful examination of
seeds before purchase or sowing is
constantly being demonstrated by the
results of the work done in this seed
testing laboratory. This need is evil
dent especially in the grasses, clovers
and alfalfa. For example, in the |
tests Of alfalfa seed alone since Jan
uary 1st Of this year forty-two per
cent of all samples examined by the
seed experts contained dodder, and in |
sixty-one per cent of this infected
alfalfa, the dodder was the most dan
gerous species known to agriculture.
One sample of alfalfa seed examined
and reported only last week contained
ISL per cent dodder. Yet per cent
of dodder is sufficient to destroy the
alfalfa crop. Alfalfa seed having l
per cent of dodder would contain about
d., 900 dodder seeds in every pound of
alfalfa and seeded at the rate of 16
pounds of alfalfa per acre 400 dodder
seeds would be sown on every square
rod of the seed bed; enough under or
dinary conditions to SO thoroughly in
fest the crop with the parasite as to
destroy the alfalfa in a single season.
Alfalfa is one of the most important
crops in the state and in the North
west. Dodder is a parasitic weed,
the seed of which when sown with the
alfalfa terminates in the ground. At
ter termination the slender tendrils of
the dodder vine reaches out, fasten
upon and coil about the alfalfa stalk.
The soil roots of the dodder then die
and the pest thereafter obtains its
directly from the growing s
tissues of the alfalfa plant, sapping it
of life in few weeks. Having des- !
troyed the alfalfa plant the dodder {
vine blossoms and seeds most prolifi- {
cally, the seed scattering upon the
ground, quickly terminating and at
tacking new alfalfa plants, thus rap
idly spreading and ultimately destroy
ing the crop, there being practically
no remedy where the dodder once gets
started.
The only means of preventing in
fection from this dangerous pest, the
seed of which so closely resembles al
falfa seed as not to be easily detected
except by experts, and which cannot
be separated from the alfalfa seed by
any cleaning device now known-is by
the refusal of the buyer to purchase or
sow alfalfa seed containing even a
minute PERCENTAGE of dodder seed.
Free of charge, the seed expert at the
seed testing laboratory at .
Corvallis will examine and Immediate {
y report upon any sample of alfalfa
,r other seed sent in by any farmer or
'eedman in Oregon or the Northwest.
If free use were made of this labora-
.Ory there is little question that dod-
Ter in the alfalfa fields of the north
vest, and in the seed harvested there |
rom. would be on the decrease in t
itead of increase as it is now.
Nor is it in dangerous impurities {
hat inferior seed is constantly being
discovered. Using alfalfa as a fur n
her illustration, termination tests of n
III the samples received at the labora-
ory since January 1st of this year =
howed the following:
Q per gent Of samples serminated 9o-1oo PEI. cent