SEEDS AND PLANTS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 20126, 20 April 1928, Page 9

SEEDS AND PLANTS

NEW RESEARCH STATION ASSISTANCE TO PRIMARY PRODUCERS. Tlie Empire Marketing Board recent, ly made a grant of £2500 for capita! cost and £2500 per annum for the maintenance costs of a research station to investigate seed and plant problems of the Dominion in all their phrases. The Government’s decision to subsidise this grant in order that the investigations may be energetically pursued has been announced by the Prime Minister (Kt. lion. J. G. Coates). “For some lime past,’’ said the Prime Minister,’’ the establishment of a Seed and Plant Research Station lias been the subject of conferences between the Council of Seient Hie and Industrial Research, the Department <>f Agriculture, and the Massey Agriculture] College Council. As the result of liiese deliberations ? satisfactory basis for conducting the researches has been reache.l, and il i work already has been commenced on the Agricultural College property at Palme i st c r. NorthA Threefold Significance4 ‘The Government is alive to the n' ccssity for promoting research into the seed and plant problems of the Dominion, since they are of far-raching significance and influence profoundly the national prosperity. Much excellent work already has been achieved by enthusiastic officers of the Department >f Agriculture, but their far-reaching serve only to reveal the magnitude cf the problems as yet uptouched.

“The work proposed to be carr’ed out at the new station will have a threefold significance. First, it will aim to d.:sccver the bes: strains a.r.d best cultural management of all crops and pastures. SoconUly, it will strive to reduce the present serious losses occasioned by the inroads of plant diseases. Thinlly, by testing, standardisation, and certification, seeds and plants of known productivity and quality will be produced and an important local and export trade in high-class seeds built

“Arrangements will be made for the closest co-operation of effort with similar stations in Great Britain and elsewhere. In particular, joint effort will be made with the Welsh Research Station at Alborystwyth, directed- by Professor Stapleton, who a short time ago visited Now Zealand and studied its pasture problems. Study of Pasture Problems. “The Seed and Plant Research Station will give additional facilities for the study of our very considerable pasture problems, upon which the wool meat, and dairy industries are so vitally dependent. These present an unlimited field for study, but, in particular, the investigations will bo directed to those studies of economic importance, to the discovery of the highly nutritious strains of cocksfoot and ryegrass, to the determination of the ideal plant associations best suited to certain soils and climates, and to the best system of pasture management in any particular class of country, to name but a few which will illustrate the nature of the work contemplated. These researches will not be confined, of course, to pasture plants, but will be extended also to cereals, root, and fodder crops, and to phormium. “The losses in the Dominion caused by the ravages of fungoid, bacterial, and insect pests have been estimated to amount to £2,500,000 annually; and, no doubt, this is a conservative figure I based on the damage done by such conspicuous diseases as Take-all of wheat, grass grub, smut, rust, and potato blight. No estimate is possible of, and. in general, no reognition is accorded to. the whole host of insidious plant posts, the aggregate damage done by which exceeds that done by the readilynoticed diseases. The Possibilities Ahead. 4 ‘Two examples wiil indicate the possibilities ahead of plant disease research. Canterbury barley crops have suffered from the ravages of smut and their yields reduced considerably thereby. A» the result of investigations, a system of seed treatment was devised and crops from treated seed have yielded an average increase of 14 bushels per acre over untreated seed. This is qui valent to a percentage increase of 26 per cent Similarly, it, has become more and more difficult to grow good crops of swede turnips owing to the prevalence of dry-rot and soft-rot diseases. Using seed specially treated, these diseases can be largely, if not wholly, eliminated. “Now Zealand alrca.ly has something of a reputation for the production o’ good grass and clover seed. New Zea land cocksfoot, brown top, Chewing: fescue, and white clover are very fav ourably known in the world’s" seed trade. Our export trade in seeds, how- •*< r, is not so largo as it might be. and. in its extension, great caro will be necessary to maintain that standard upon which the present reputation is base.!. Certification, after careful testing, alone will ensure this. New Zealand wild white clover seed must b ■ harvested from wild white, clover areas and not from those sewn down with re-cently-imported seed. Of Interest to Every Farmer. “The work of the Seed, an. 3 Plant Station will be of an exceedingly varied nature, and the above examples rerve only very briefly to explain a few the matters with which it will deal. “It will bo clear, however, that it will deal with matters of importance to every farmer in New Zealand, be he pastoralist, agriculturist, flaxgrower, or orchardist.

*‘Furthermore, tho work will be bv no means limited to Palmerston North, for trial areas will be established throughout the Dominion in those locations where a particular problem is all-im-portant. In the past, many agricultural trials have produced few useful results, often because of the absence of a sound experimental technique and method of interpretation. This difficulty now has been largely overcome, so that results secured at the Sccrl and Plant Station will be at once of great practical value, and use to farmers.

“The Government feels that, in making this station available, it is rendering assistance of the soundest kind based on careful scientfic foundations to help first of all our primary producers, and, in consequence, through them, the prosperity of the whole Dominion/