Evening star., 1940-10-27

entail mill.
| plant, your own tulip beds, or the
front lawn. just as they do with
Uncle Ebners garden patch and
l,000-acre wheat farm. Microscopes
will be set up so that visitors may
see forms of animal life that live
in the soil and cause heavy losses to
farmers and gardeners by attack
ing the roots of plants.
Ends of Earth Contribute.
Plant introduction will be the next
theme, in charge of B. Y. Morrison,
whose word is authority in Wash
ington and this section of the coun-
try for the educational work he has
done among garden clubs ana those
who are interested In better gardens.
Growing plants set up against a
background of huge photo murais
showing scenes in foreign lands will
portray some of the romance. as well
as the economic Improvements to
plants that have been brought back
by plant explorers of the depart
ment from literally the four corners
of the earth.
Another display will feature plant
breeding from many divisions of the
bureau. This group will be un0er
the general supervision OF j. Il.
Kempton, who is one of the de-
partments leading authorities on
plant heredity and how this affects
future production.
This group of exhibits will show
how plants from foreign lands have
been used to breed disease resistance
and other desirable characteristics in
our crop plants. Here, growing
sugar cane Is feet high will be on
display, as we'll as cotton plants full
Of open bolls.
Actual living plants will show the
results of plant breeding with such
important crops as corn. cotton. to-
bacco, sugar cane. sugar beets,
sorghum, tomatoes and many others.
Instructions for Lawn.
A special feature for the third
week will be a plot with beautiful
bluegrass lawn in front OF the foun-
tain. There will be another one,
too, full of weeds and crab grass. A
free booklet will tell how you can
make a lawn look like the good plot.
Growing four-leaf clovers is as
easy as one, two, three for plant
breeders. The plants to be seen
were selected by the same methods
which will develop disease-resistant
strains of clovers in lawns. These,
in turn, will help to keep out the
crab grass.
An international and pan
American touch is the romance "of
ropes and things" of which Kip
ling sings. This exhibit will drama
tie the far cry 1t is from barefoot
coolies in the tropics stripping the
leaves from the abaca, plant that
looks like banana-to the thou
sand and one uses to which it is put
as rope. This is timely because as
soon as war breaks out anywhere
shortage Of rope usually ensues.
In this connection the Bureau OF
Plant Industry is now cooperating
with republics of Central America
in trying to establish abaca planta-
tions so that the rope fiber may
be grown on this side of the world.
Poinsettias will constitute another
exhibit in this group, with certain
branches in bloom as they will be
at the height of the Christmas
season. Other branches on the same
plant will not be in bloom. What
has caused the difference? The
branches in bloom have been sub
jected to shortened days of SUM-
light, as in December, and that
has made them bloom.
The demonstration of macaroni
making by Mr.. Fifleld is not cook
ing exhibit. It's purpose is to show
how the quality of macaroni de-
pends upon plant breeding. Special
types of wheat have been developed
especially for high-quality maca-
roni.
AMT japanese" Lilies.
The Easter lilies were not tricked
into blooming now by changing the
length OF day-as were the poin-
settias. The bulbs were grown in
the South and put into cold storage
for few weeks last summer. This
system produces bigger, better and
earlier blooms than from the Japa-
nese bulbs, which our florists have
used in the past. This discovery is
expected to divert $4,000, 900 year
from Japanese farmers to those in
our own South.
Now about those potato chips that
taste sweet and are brown instead
of having the salty, clear. translu-
cent quality we prefer. The whole
trick, according to these same Agri-
culture Department scientists, Is to
store the potatoes at a tempera-
ture of about go degrees instead OF
the more usual one Of from 40 to
IS degrees. The higher temperature
prevents the starch from changing
into sugar. The sugar which forms
from the starch of the potatoes At
20 degrees is what makes the chips
turn brown and taste sweet-and
there you are.