A WHEAT CROSS.

Press, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20543, 11 May 1932, Page 4

A WHEAT CROSS.

! ENCOURAGING RESULTS. j FLOUR OF GOOD BAKING j QUALITY. [ The wheat cross, Solid Straw Tuscan with White Fife, established at Canterbury Agricultural College, Lincoln, eight years ago, may yet establish itself as of such quality and suitability to Canterbury conditions that incentive to import Canadian wheat to mix with New Zealand in order to get the best loaf of bread should disappear. This hopeful statement is made in a report placed before the Board of Governors of the Colloge which met yesterday. The study of the cross Solid Straw Tuscan with White Fife has advanced one stage further during the harvest just concluded, the report states. This cross was made at the College eight years ago, and last year we reported on 15 lines of reasonable purity. These were equal to Tuscan in ail growth characters, and adaptability to our varying Canterbury conditions. ThV were approximately equal to Tuscan in yield gave 5 per cent, more flour, and al3 per cent, better loaf. The fifteen lines were reduced to nine, and ruli vield trials of these were made on the College farm, and field trials of some of them in three other localities. Three or four of the lines proved again equal to Tuscan in yield at Lincoln, Methven, and Darfield, while they were inferior at Wakanui. Milling and baking tests are now in progress. If these prove as favourable as last year, the future of this cross should be fairly hopeful. Tf what now appear to be reasonable expectations are realised New Zealand shouldl i«o able profitably to grow a wheat that will by itself give as good a loat as the mixture of New Zealand and Canadian wheats now used, and the incentive to' import Canadian wheat shout" largely disappear. As the seed which is used in yield trials naturally becomes impure, «ew pure lines were selected three years ago, and these have been bred up™ as to supply pure seed of the selected family when tho final selection i* made. A yield trial of these re-selec-tions has just been completed, and the best picked' out so that we shall be in the position to supply to frr'ners pure seed of the best line immediately we are in a position to make a lecommendation.