The Hawaiian gazette., 1912-06-28

w nNNIfNas ~ tNN UNI 81 tuuf ~ I've
days the kernels will hs ready 70
spfoui. II " then the easy matter 20
ttll which ears are good for se'd and
whieh ase not The Kernels In each
square are carefully examined. and
whore they do not give coed evidence
Of good terminating power che ear Of
corn corresponding 10 that square
should be discarded.
In scoring, the kernels fall into four
classes, a. shown In the illustration.
No. I ~ dead. No. IL weak, having
rootlets only. No. IL weak, having
sprouts only. No. 4 IL strong, having
both rootlets and sprouts.
Let M suppose that this process has
been taught TO the school and that
every child knows how TO do Il. There
may be twenty or twenty-five pupils In
one district school. Each pupil Is then
requested 60 90 TO his father, a relative
or to some neighbor who has no child
rem, and ask him for twelve ears Of
seed corn, selected according to his best
J Judgment In this way the farmers Of
| the entire district are pretty well COW
cred, each man becoming the "part'
ner', of the child to whom he has Civ
en- the ears Of corn. The children then
prepared their "rag babies" and keep
them at home until the seed begin TO
sprout.
Finally day is selected when they
are brought back to school for examl-
nation and marking. It will be found
that some ears are wholly dead, and
others too weak to plant. After the re-
suit is determined each pupil takes his
score card home to his man partner and
shows him the results He is also re-
ouested to substitute good ears for the
bad ones. The pupil next does little
private testing Of his own, and is then
ready for the final testing, at which all
of the men partners are invited to be
present. The result of all this is that
each farmer is put into competition
with his neighbor as to his ability to
J select good seed corn, and the way thus
paved to an increase in the size and
quality of his crop.
} The Crop Improvement Committee is
] carrying on an especially active cam
paign this year, urging the necessity Of
testing seed corn. According to Mr..
Ball. repeated tests from all over the
country have shown that the dampness
in immature corn has caused much OF 1t
! to be frozen so that it will not grow.
emo man can select corn by looking
} Mt it, said Mr.. Ball. "He may be
able to tell some that will not grow,
} but he can never be sure of that which
) will grow. 1 recently tested an ear
J taken from a lot that won $l,O0O
prize in Iowa last year and found that
it was more than half dead at the top.
One bad kernel in a hill often kills all
the others, and it is mistaken notion
that you can overcome weakness by
J planting an additional quantity OF
seed. ~
The average ear of seed corn has
about eight hundred kernels, each OF
which should produce a stalk bearing
one ear. This would mean eight hun
, dred ears, or about eight bushels,
. which at fifty cents would sell for 81
D II requires just as much labor to plant
Door ear of corn as it does to plant a
: good ear, and the poor ear does not
give anything in return for the time
and work.
a When it is considered that it takes
o only about twelve ears of corn to plant
d an acre, and that every poor seed Q
y farmer uses actually costs him between
J. four and five bushels of corn, or in the
t neighborhood of So, it is surprising
g what large percentage of seed corn II
o used annually without anything de
n finite being known as to whether 1t Ii
n of strong terminating power.
Q The agricultural kindergarten plan
Q which has for its basis the "rag bah.
d test is but a part of the genera
o scheme of work being carried on by TIT
t Crop Improvement Committee. Perhap
o it's most important endeavor IS tn
d establishment of n trained agriculturls
o in each of the counties of all the North
ern States, and, in addition to sun
y supplied to number of counties by tn
d United States Department of Farm
1t Management, national fund for thu
n purpose is now being raised in order t.
t stimulate local interest.
t. "In case you are i'll, said Mr.. Bal
g "'you get the best physician you know
" hut how many farmers are there VIII
20 will send for doctor for their sic'
is SOIL in order to develop the yleld
le their money cropf
n "The trouble with us all has bee
20 that we have considered farming ex
ID clusively the farmers business, wher
10 as matter of fact, there is not a mar
m woman or child in any community WIN
L is not just as vitality interested in
larger Weld of better quality as tn
L man who actually grows it.
O. "What we want and must have is
De country agriculturist who will G
'e around day after day studying the II
he innate problems on each farm, gettin
le acquainted with each man individuali!
Id comforting with him as to the bes
he methods and taking his successes to tn
a men who fail, thus gradually weedin
ont absolute methods and encouragin
~ every man to follow regularly th'
"a which he already knows, but too otte
III fails to put into practice.
II, at is business proposition, an
ed there is not a county in the Unite
~ States which would not be a millio
dollars richer every year by the intr
Us Us duction of proper methods of far
~ management.