EXPERIMENTAL FARMING IN CANADA.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XXVII, Issue 103, 3 May 1893, Page 4

EXPERIMENTAL FARMING IN CANADA.

Globe, An annual report on experimental farms has been issued from the Ministry of Agriculture. In it the director of these farms in Canada states that during the season of 1891 farmers in almost every part of the Dominion of Canada have been blessed with bountiful crops. With few exceptions favourable weather for seeding, growth, and harvesting has prevailed from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and the results have been such as to provoke a general spirit ofgthankfulness among those engaged in agricultural pursuits. Compared with the average of the past nine years, the statistics of Ontario show an increase for the past year in that province in fall fall wheat of 5" 7 bushels per acre ; in spring wheat, s'*4 bushels; barley, 3'2; oats, 5*7 ; peas, 3*6 ; and of corn in the ear of 9'h bushels per acre. In turnips the crop has been increased above the average for the period named by 13G bushels per acre ; mangolds, 76 bushels ; carrots, 36 bushels ; and potatoes, 28 ,( J bushels, the only items where there has been any falling oil' being in beans and hay. The former is less than the average by I*3 bushels per acre, and the latter by about four-tenths of a ton per acre. This last has no doubt been due to the very dry weather which prevailed generally during the month of June. Farmers have also had favourable results in the Marime Provinces. In Manitoba and the North- West Territories, notwithstanding the strong winds which prevailed in the spring and the early frosts in autumn, the returns on the whole have been most bountiful. The stores of fertility laid np by Nature with so liberal a hand in the soil of those fertile plains promise food and plenty in the future to incoming multitudes. In British Columbia also almost every sort of crop is said to have been above the average. The outlook from an agricultural standpoint is mosfc encouraging for Canada, for it will be found that, associated with the favourable season, there have been improvements in the preparation of the soil, in the selection oi the seed, and in the general management of tho crops, showing that increased intelligence is being brought to bear on farm work. The stores of fertility in the soil are being more carefully husbanded by a judicious succession of crops, and greater pains are taken to replace the elements which repeated cropping has removed. The mental inactivity of the past augurs well for the future. That much may still be done by the farmer to improve his condition and add to his profits will scarcely admit of a doubt, and while there are some conditions which affect his crops wlych are beyond his control, the intelligent application of improved ,jnethods will enable him to make the ' very best of every favourable circum stance which may arise. One of the mosfc important means of improvement within his reach is the selection of good seed, and ifc is worth while to pause and consider how much may be involved in this one point, hitherto so often neglected. Every seed has an individuality of its own impressed on it by nature, which under favouring conditions, will manifest itself. Each is provided with a germ wherein lies this impress of individuality, and this germ is imbedded in a store of such food as is best suited to stimulate tlio growth of the young plant. Wheu tho seed is plump that food supply is bountiful, and the infant plant so nourished makes rapid headway ; but where the seed is shrunken and imperfectly developed the store of nourishment is much lessened. After the young plant has begun to grow, a period of comparative rest is needed, during which growth above is scarcely perceptible, until the roots are sufficiently extended to gather food for furtlier development; the rapidity with which this progress is made depends very much on the plumpness and inherent vigour of the seedCrops are thus often enfeebled at thc start and delayed in ripening by the use of poor seed, or they . ripen unevenly and lack that vigour so necessary to a liberal return. As an illustration take the oat crop. How often it has occurred that farmers have held over for seed such oats as were too poor quality to sell to advantage, thinking that any sort was good enough for this purpose, and how frequently has the yield been poor and the grain of light weight. It is not unusual for good farmer who provido good .seed of fertile sorts to have crops of this grain of from fifty to sixty bushels per acre, while the average is about thirty-five bushels ; by the exercise of greater care in this respect the average production may be "materially increased, and every additional bushel per acre would in Ontario alone ad d to the returns of the farming cop j. munity nearly 615,000 dols. a yc.Rj*. Or, taking the improvement in ano iher line, it is well known that f^me farmers by the selection of good plump seed and thorough preparation of the soil grow oats from four to eight pounds heavier per bushel than many of their neighbours. It should not be j forgotten that with an equal yield in I measured bu&l_.-l& per acre an average/

increase in the single province of Ontario of one per bushel in weight in the entire crop would Jbe a gain to the farmers, basing the estimate on the crop of last year, of 750,000 dols. per annum. An addition of one bushel per acre on the wheat crop of Ontario, including both fall and spring wheat, would in '.like [manner add to the gains of the farmers over 1,300,000 dols. in a single season- These statements respecting wheat and oats will apply with more or less force to every other crop.