Page images
PDF
EPUB

(3) The borrower is responsible for the safe return of the books and is expected to make good any losses or injuries which may occur. Books must be carefully wrapped when returned so that there will be no danger of injury to book or binding.

(4) Cost of carriage must be borne by the borrower. Books will be forwarded by express (charges collect) whenever it is deemed necessary on account of their size or value. Certain books, however, may be sent by registered mail if the cost of postage and registration be remitted in advance. In the case of books lent for use in the official work of the State agricultural colleges and experiment stations, those which it is considered safe to send by mail will be forwarded under the department frank, and a frank will be sent for their return. The cost of registration for the return of the book must, however, be paid by the borrower.

(5) It is preferred that requests from agricultural colleges and experiment stations be made through the college or station library, if the library is so organized as to be able to attend to such loans.

(6) Borrowers are urged to give as full a reference as possible when requesting loans, including author, title, and page of articles in periodicals. This is desirable for the following reasons: The article can sometimes be supplied in separate form; the volume of the periodical may be unbound, in which case only a single number need be sent; references are sometimes incorrect, and information as to the author and title of the article may prevent the sending of the wrong volume; if the article is short and the volume large, it may be more economical to have the article copied.

REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF THE OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT

STATIONS.

U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,

OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS, Washington, D. C., September 15, 1911.

SIR: I have the honor to present herewith the report of the Office of Experiment Stations for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1911.

Respectfully,

Hon. JAMES WILSON,

Secretary of Agriculture.

A. C. TRUE, Director.

INTRODUCTION.

The work of the Office of Experiment Stations during the last year included, as heretofore, the supervision of the expenditures of Federal (Hatch and Adams) funds by the agricultural experiment stations in the several States and Territories; conferences and correspondence with station officers regarding the management, equipment, and work of the stations; the collection and dissemination of information regarding the progress of agricultural education and research throughout the world; the management of the agricultural experiment stations in Alaska, Hawaii, Porto Rico, and Guam; the promotion of the interests of agricultural colleges and schools and farmers' institutes in the United States; special investigations on irrigation and drainage largely in cooperation with experiment stations, educational institutions, and other agencies; and the investigation of problems relating to the utilization of agricultural products as food for man.

The progress and present status of these different lines of work are briefly reviewed below.

RELATIONS WITH AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATIONS.

The work and expenditures of the experiment stations continue to increase in volume and in variety, and as a consequence a greater amount of attention from this office is required. This increase in station affairs is the natural result of the better financial conditions in which these institutions are placed through the increased Federal funds and other resources. The Adams fund has now reached its maximum and is equal to the Hatch fund, and many of the States

are meeting the needs and requirements of their stations by granting substantial appropriations not only for their maintenance but also for definite lines of investigation. The growing demands of a progressive agriculture and the generally better financial status of the experiment stations tend to enlarge their scope of action, increase their capacity, and multiply their lines of work. This greater development of the institutions demands a more careful consideration relative to the expenditure of the different funds over which the stations have control in order to determine the policy pursued in the use of the Federal funds. In this connection numerous questions arise with regard to the legitimate and most effective use of these funds for experimental and research work.

The multiplicity of station duties, coupled with their greater and varied resources, has involved a closer inspection and a stricter adherence to the policy of restricting the Federal funds to actual experimental work. As the law demands that the Federal funds shall be used chiefly for experimental and research work, it is practically imperative that the stations should have some other revenues upon which to draw for administrative needs, printing, and those lines of work often demanded by the State, such as inspection, demonstration work, and other duties which evidently can lay no claim to being financed, even in part, from the Federal funds.

The policy of the office in relation to the Hatch and Adams funds is resulting in a more careful arrangement of the budget by the station officials and the boards of control. It is observed that when the budget is carefully arranged there is now little or no deviation throughout the year from the plan as outlined. When the needs of the different departments of the station are not previously considered the funds are frequently unevenly expended or used in enterprises which do not give the most useful results.

The apportionment of salaries in cases where station officials have also college duties requires continued supervision. The proper apportionment of salaries requires the close scrutiny of the station director, who should make the arrangement with the president of the college before its submittal to and approval by the board of control. In the approval of Adams fund projects the experimental work proposed and submitted has been subjected to more searching scrutiny, which has led to a more extensive correspondence regarding the work before it is entered upon, in order to arrive at a full understanding with reference to methods, objects, and purpose of the proposed investigation, and for the purpose of placing the work on the proper basis. The policy in relation to the kind of projects approved has been more rigidly enforced that the work submitted must be definite, restricted, and specific. The experience of the past five years has clearly shown the inadvisability of accepting blanket projects, or propositions too wide in scope or too indefinite in purpose or method. As a rule where the project has not been restricted and held to the definite proposition the work has been superficial and scattering and has lacked directness and objectiveness. Every reasonable effort is therefore being made to hold the use of the Federal funds within the terms of the law, and to restrict expenditures from the Adams fund to necessary expenses directly connected with definite research projects of high grade.

Dropping projects before their completion is one of the greatest drawbacks to progress of work under the Adams or research fund. When projects are discontinued special inquiry is made with regard to the reason therefor, and if deemed feasible it has been urged that the work be brought to a definite conclusion. These discontinuances of lines of investigation result in reality in a waste of money, and arise mainly from changes of men on the station staffs and from the failure of the station management to fully appreciate the necessity of systematic continued work.

There probably has never been an attempt to supervise so large an amount of investigation as the Adams fund projects of the experiment stations. The legality of the expenditures is so largely dependent on the character of the investigation that the supervision of the funds requires much careful study of the investigations as far as their character, original features, and continuity are concerned.

This is a very large undertaking, with 48 States and Territories each receiving $15,000, or a total of $720,000, and with a list of approximately 290 projects, of which 21 were completed during the past fiscal year and 43 were approved and entered upon. The situation is often complicated by the partial support of projects from other funds, and by the extent to which the Adams fund is divided among relatively small undertakings and a large number of workers.

The rapid expansion of the work of the stations in various directions has in some cases put too heavy administrative burdens on the directors, and has brought into their service many comparatively young and inexperienced investigators or men with comparatively limited scientific training. To this must be added the fact that the relative newness of agricultural science and the complicated character of most of its problems make the clear differentiation of specific problems for research relatively difficult. Thus questions often arise as to what the problem really is and what is involved in its investigation. This office is therefore often called upon to go beyond what would be required by a formal administration of the Adams Act and to act in an advisory way regarding the planning and execution of research. In doing this it endeavors to give the stations the benefit of its broad study of the world's literature of agricultural science and its knowledge of the conditions under which agricultural research is being conducted in many institutions.

In addition increased attention has been given to the Hatch fund and to the sales fund derived from the two Federal funds. These, it is maintained, should be devoted as far as possible to definite experimental work and not be absorbed in paying the administrative and general running expenses of the stations. They should also not be used for demonstrations or other forms of extension work for which there is now such a widespread demand, but which should be provided for in other ways. It is impracticable to formulate definitions covering all questions regarding the division and use of the Federal funds which may arise from time to time, but the office is endeavoring to assist the stations in working out the best methods of using these and other funds at their disposal.

The publication of the records of investigation remains a question of much importance. This office maintains that the records of station work are to be recognized as the property of the particular station

at which or for which the work was done. There has been some laxity in the matter of recognizing this principle, and in a number of cases records have been carried away from the station by the individual worker on severing his connection with the institution. Whenever it has been the intent to appropriate such material and to use and publish it at an experiment station in some other State, the office has refused to approve a project based upon such action without the consent of the station where the work was originally done.

The lack of a suitable place for the publication of results of investigation in technical detail still continues. In numerous instances station workers have published in scientific journals in this country and abroad such technical results as they did not consider advisable to publish in the ordinary station bulletin. Among the stations better provided with funds a number have inaugurated the publication of a series of technical or research bulletins, and while this relieves the situation to a certain extent it does not adequately provide for bringing the results to the notice of the interested public, even in so far as these particular institutions are concerned. The coming of the Adams fund tends to complicate the situation, inasmuch as it provides much work of a technical character, while at the same time the fund can not be used for publication. The results of this work, in many cases, demand presentation in detail from a strictly scientific point of view. Provision for the proper and adequate publication of such technical matter as is worked out by the station investigators throughout this country would not only be a direct encouragement to every station worker, but would also bring the scientific world in touch with the research features of our experiment station system, and would give to it the standing in the realm of science to which it is clearly entitled.

The detailed review of the work and expenditures of all the stations for the fiscal year 1910, published in the annual report of this office for that year, contains many evidences of substantial progress in research and the accumulation of useful practical results. The same is true of the similar review for the year 1911 now being made by the office. On the whole, the American experiment stations are steadily strengthening their organization and their work. The volume of results strictly beneficial to our agriculture is constantly swelling. The number of farmers and horticulturists who are taking advantage of the work of the stations is now very large, and each year brings additional evidence of the increasing esteem in which practical men hold the institutions devoted to scientific study of the problems of agriculture.

RELATIONS WITH INSTITUTIONS FOR AGRICULTURAL

EDUCATION.

In my report for 1910 I called attention to the rapid development of public interest in the broader phases of agricultural education and to the evidence that the right solution of the problems of country life and agricultural production will depend very largely on an effective system of practical education which will reach the masses of men, women, and children on the farms. Reference was also made to the complexity of the problems involved in organizing

« PreviousContinue »