The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1920-10-06
BREEDS COTTON
TO RESIST WILT
Florence Man Announces Success
Of Experiment-Many Tests
Made.

Florence, Oct. 2.-The successful
breeding of a wilt resistant cotton,
which will meet boil weevil condi-
tions, is announced by DR.. L. o.
Watson of Florence, who repre-
sents the United States government
in his scientific research, expert
ment and effort, covering the past
ten years. After decade of work,
this expert, who, at one time had
charge of all the wilt resistant in
vestigation and control work of the
United States, has produced plant
which has been proved by trials in
many Western and Southern states
on wilt infected lands under sever
est boil weevil conditions to meet
the requirements of these tWofold
pests.
AS briefly stated by the breeder,
this new cotton is a hybrid of the
famous Triumph cotton, which en-
abled Texas to continue growing
cotton after the appearance of the
boil weevil in that state from Mexi-
co, and of the Dixie variety,
which was one of the earliest and
most successful strains developed by
the government to overcome the
cotton wilt. 1t is named the Dixie
Triumph. The first attempts at
breeding were made by DR.. Watson
ten years ago on this cross. Since
then all efforts have been centered
on production true to type, COM
bining in proper proportion the
characteristics of each of the origi-
mails. The result today is an early
variety, of medium size stalk, ex-
'ceptionally large bolls for wilt re-
sistant cotton and good yielder.
All these experiments and breed
ing efforts have been conducted on
the place of the late J. C. c. Brun-
son, about three miles from Flor
ence. Mr.. Brunson tended to the
growing end of the business till his
death this spring. incidentally, Mr..
Brunson achieved such noteworthy
and commendable results in cotton
mprovcments that Clemson college
conferred upon him the diploma Of
merit, of which it has issued less
than half a dozen, in recognition of
the benefits he had produced for
Southern agriculture. DR.. Watson
handled all of the breeding work
and of late has had associated with
him E. E. Hall of Clemson college.
lested In MS State.
In 1917, when the breeder made
his first general tests of his new
breed in South Carolina, his seed
were planted on 400 acres of wilt
infected lands. At 2S cents per
pound, the users of these seed esti-
mated, by careful check on their
crops, that the increased production
alone brought them in $127,12O.12.
DR.. Watson has not tabulated any
more recent reports on his seed in
this way. However, he has had them
tried out in Georgia, Louisiana,
Arkansas and Texas, where both
weevil and wilt have been most
damaging, and the general results
reported have been increased yields
of from double to four times any
other varities. Clemson college has
tried out this new variety and re-
ports it as one of the best yet pro-
duced.
In instance and typical of the
performance of this variety, when
DR.. Watson began his experiments
here ten years ago the land on the
Brunson place which he selected
for his work was yielding less than
quarter of bale to the acre and
some seasons the production was on
ly one bale to ten acres. Today he is
picking a bale to bale and one-half
to the acre and is striving to incease
this yield even more. In this connec-
tion, DR.. Watson selected the place
of Mr.. Brunson's because it was so