SOIL RESEARCH

Waipa Post, Volume 36, Issue 2148, 24 April 1928, Page 2

SOIL RESEARCH

SAVING THE COUNTRY MILLIONS EACH YEAR. VALUABLE ASSET OF RESEARCH STATION. Losses that now amount to millions each year will be saved New Zealand by the establishment at Palmerston North of a Plant Research Station, and already thousands of pounds of annually-recurring losses have been prevented by the operations of one branch of research activities alone (says the Manawatu Daily Times). The establishment of a Plant Research Station has been the subject of conferences between the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, the Department of Agriculture, and the Massey College Council, and as a result of those deliberations the College Council has placed at the disposal of the Research Station 24 acres at Fitzherbert—l4 acres on the flat and 10 acres on the terrace. It is the intention of the Department to erect modern laboratories almost immediately, and, while the investigation of plant diseases and their elimination will be the primary work of the station, those specialising in different subjects will be available as lecturers.

However, as a preliminary, a laboratory has been established in Princess Street under the charge of Dr G. H. Cunningham. Eventually the staff will comprise an entomologist and assistants to deal with insect and animal pests; an agristologist to deal with pasture establishment and maintenance; an agronomist to deal with pedigree plant selection; a farm economy branch to study farm costing and all that implies; a fields experimentalist and assistants; and an administration staff. At present only the mycologist (Dr Cunningham) and his staff of six are in Palmerston North.

The ideal of the mycological laboratory is to produce for the farmer pedigree, disease-free seed, and already much has been done in this direction. WORTH MILLIONS TO NEW ZEALAND.

For example, dry rot in swedes has cost New Zealand an annual loss of one and a half millions. It has been found by ■ the mycological laboratory that this disease is carried in the seed and an efficient seed treatment has been worked out to eliminate the disease. The matter was not left there, however. The English seed producers were persuaded to treat the mother seed from which they garnered their bulk supply. The result will soon be coming to New Zealand, and the muchdreaded dry rot will be a thing of the past. POTATO DISEASES. Potato diseases have been occupying the attention of the laboratory for some time. It has been found that practically all potato diseases are carried in or upon the tuber, and to obtain a clean crop it is necessary to eliminate these diseases from the seed tubers. This (elimination is possible only by plant selection—picking out the disease-free plants and propagating from them. The diseased plants invariably throw small tubers, yet, peculiarly enough, it is the small potatoes that the farmer invariably selects for his seed instead of the large, healthy ones, which are sent away to market. What has been the effect of this practice? Year after year dis-ease-infected tubers have been planted, materially reducing the Dominion yield. By an alteration in farming practice to the extent of using large instead of small potatoes for seed, heavier crojls have been secured, because disease losses have been lessened. The mycological laboratory, however, is not satisfied with a reduction of diseases, and is now aiming at complete (elimination. Such will be possible solely through elaborate selection, and wil ltake years to obtain complete results. Further, it is necessary in a work of this kind to improve the strain concurrently with the elimination of disease; hence the need for an agronomist whose duties are propagating pedigree lines. It may be pointed out here that potato varieties to-day are badly mixed. Another work is the elimination of cereal smuts from wheats, oats, and barleys, and this, at the present time, has proceeded beyond the laboratory stage to field treatment on an extensive scale. A LARGE SAVING.

In Otago and Southland alone the estimated loss from smuts in 1925-26 was £115,000. This season a cereal survey revealed the pleasing fact that oat smut has been practically eliminated from that area by a seed treatment devised by the mycological laboratory which is at present in Palmerston North. Takeall is another serious disease that the farmer has to contend with, and in certain seasons it will destroy up to 50 per cent of a crop. This disease is also under investigation, as well as rusts and root rots of cereals.

The elimination of club root, which is also being investigated, will not only mean thousands of pounds saved to New Zealand, but will also affect farming practice very considerably. Collar-rot in peas, which in Marlborough is responsible for an annual

loss of £15,000, has also been traced to seed infection, and the laboratory has undertaken to work out a method of treatment. OF INTEREST OF EVERY FARMER. The work of the Seed and Plant Station will be of exceedingly varied nature, and the above examples serve only Very briefly to explain a few of the matters with which it will deal. It will be clear, however, that it will deal with matters of importance to evei'y farmer in New Zealand, be he pastoralist, agriculturist, flaxgrower, or orchardist. HANDSOME DONATIONS. The Empire Marketing Board recently made a grant of £2500 for capital cost and £2500 per annum for the maintenance cost of a research station to investigate seed and plant problems of New Zealand in all their phases. The Government’s decision to subsidise this grant in order that the investigations may be energetically pursued was announced by the Prime Minister on Saturday.