The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1917-09-03

ana me lQanO hepuDllcan taxes OC-
casion to gather information from
where it is to be had, and pass
it on to where it will do some good.
The hub Of the pure seed belt is
in the Pure Seed club, whose mem
bers live between Springfield and
Sterling and at Aberdeen, chiefly.
All of these seed kings have automo-
biles and receive invitations to ad-
dress meetings all up and down and
across, so if person goes out gun
ming for them he is in luck to find
any of them at home. The writer
found George A. Line at home and
he sat at his rool-tOp desk and sub
mitted to the pumping for ideas and
information.
When we accused him of being in
the pure seed bushes he admitted
it. When we accused him of hav-
ing made money out of it he laugh
ed. When we ventured the guess
that his new barn. his seed house,
his big car ana his fine house with
it's sleeping porch supported by state
ly colonial columns had been paid
for with money filched from happy
purchasers of pure seed he laughed
again, and said that Taylor brothers
of Blackfoot would be tickled to
death to build something like it on
every farm for miles around.
When we asked him if pure
seed man always sat at a roll-top
desk with a telephone at his elbow,
he said, mo, not always" He said
that pure seed is raised on fields that
grow plants of a certain kind. That
field set to Grimm alfalfa, for in
stance, grows Grimm alfalfa ex-
clusively till something else gets in
to it. There are good many things
that may intrude, some of the most
troublesome being dodder, buckhorn
and sweet clover. The things that
grow when alfalfa is growing, and
that ripen when it ripens, and whose
seeds are about the same size and
pass thru screen where alfalfa
seeds pass, reduce the purity of the
seed and cut down the price that a
man may expect to receive. The
seed man who has few of these
undesirable residents" in his seed
field, if he is a live-wire will be
out extracting them before they go
to seed. There are lots of other
things that have to be looked after
and kept out. The pure seed man
who knows buckhorn, if he is pass
ing thru his fields will try to "see
buckhorn first" and get rid Of it.
This same principle applies to many
things relative to moisture, weed
pests and plant growth.
1t has been said that one water
ing for seed crop was about right
and again, the best seed had grown
where it had been watered twice.
Accidents have happened and parts
of seed tracts have been watered
three times and this made the
heaviest yield of any part of the
field. A close study of these things
is revealing facts that throw new
light on seed production. Plants that
are watered early in the season so
they make large plants, do not de-
vote much energy to making seed.
The best known methods now are
to keep them only fairly moist in
che fore part of summer, but to keep
them supplied with enough moisture
to make a liberal setting of spikes
and seeds and then continuation Of
enough moisture to mature all the
seeds. But in that there is danger
point. The moisture may be over
done and the plant may put out new
shoots and turn its energies into
making hay instead of maturing the
seed A seed man does not keep
informed of these conditions by sit
ting at his roll-top desk, but by
watching day in and day out, the
tendencies of the plants. Anything
that tends to dwarf the plant in the
spring and to make it strong and
sturdy rather than luxuriant will
help to keep it's energies lined up
for making bloom, spikes and seeds.
If it is short of moisture at bloom
ing time, the spikes will be few and
short, and no amount of soaking
after that will enable it to go back
and set larger bloom and spikes, and
without them there is no seed. A
man may be lucky enough to get
a good yield without paying much
attention to it, and then he may
have a reverse of fortune, but the
man who studies it closely and keeps
in such close touch with nature that
he can forsee it's need and mould
it's plans and direct it's energies by
or applying moisture, is
the man who is likely to have the
big yield every year. The man who
keeps everything else but alfalfa out
Of his seed tract is the man who will
have pure seed so far as mere
physical purity is concerned, but
there is something in the original
breeding of the seed that affects its
vigor and the form of its roots and
stalks, the same as there is some
thing in the original breeding of ami
mails that guages their vigor and
form, so when one speaks of pure
seed he may refer to either one or
both of these conditions.
A man who is going to raise seed
should secure a start Of the best
bred seed he can get. 1t costs no
more to be blowing, narrowing,
harvesting and threshing
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