SUPER WHEAT.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14588, 12 February 1913, Page 4

SUPER WHEAT.

A SCIENTIFIC TRIUMPH

£1666 POR £8 8s

(FjOOU or~ OWN co-respondent.) LOND-ON, January 3. Tho Cambridge University School of Agriculture is very proud of "Little Joss," the super wheat which has vindicated in a remarkable manner the work of the scientific agriculturist. Ono quarter of "Littlo Joss" increased in two years to 770 quarters, which realised £1666 7s 3d. Tho crop was raised by Mr W. R. Elgar on eight farms in the Sittingbourne district. "Little Joss" is a pedigreo wheat, and according to Professor R. H. Biffen, of tho School of Agriculture, its pedigree is as follows:— Square Heads, Master —Ghirka—Little Joss. The wheat was bred with the object of producing a growth that would resist "yellow rust" and tho experiment has proved co successful that the most sceptical agriculturists of the "rule of thumb" school have been obliged to own that Little Joss is atriumph of scientific wheat culture. Mr Elgar himself disclaims credit for raising the record-breaking crop. "AH the credit really belongs to Professor Biffen." ho said. "All I did was to bow the wheat on different farms, in tho hope that it would turn out to be a good variety. I havo always been ready to try anything new in this way as an experiment, and Avhen I heard of this new wheat that had been produced at Cambridge, I managed to get bold of a quarter to try, at a cost of a guinea a bushel, cr eight guineas in all. I planted the "Little Joss" in th» best field.l had —one of five and a-half acres which had been under hops for some years.

'Tho wheat was sown ono and a-half

bushel to the acre, just in the ordinary way. No special methods were used, and no more care taken than, is usual in sowing good wheat. : THE IDEAL WHEAT. "That ono quarter of wheat produced a crop of forty-three quarters five bushels, a result co good that I thought I would go on. Really, the wonderful increase which has caused so much curErise is due to the good results of the rst year. All that first crop was sown again, over "130} acres of land— and land that varied a great deal. Some of it was exceedingly wet, and only averaged three quarters two bushels to the acre. But the whole crop was splendid, arid averaged five quarters seven bushels to the acre. Not only was this a wonderful yield, but Professor Biffen has produced an ideal wheat—the sort that millers and agricultural chemists have been aiming at for a long time. Technically speaking, •Little Joss' is a good millers' wheat, and a good cropping wheat, with a good straw." This, Mr Elgar explained, is where 6o many scientific wheats fail; they are good perhaps in one respect and bad in another. But "Little Joss" has come triumphantly through the mill and the oven alike. The straw also of this wonderful crop is a valuable consideration; and" the testimony of an old thatcher, who has thatched with it a barn belonging to Mr Elgar, was that it was the best straw he had seen nnd nearly as good as reeds.

Enough of the yield of 770 quarters was kept back to plant another 400 acres, and now Mr Elgar is waiting to see what "Little Joss" will do next year. Judging from the yield bo far from his experiment, ha believes the increase of that first quarter should bo somewhere near 10,000 quarters.