La cosecha quedaba así más que duplicada por la selección de las semillas y por su plantación separada a ocho pulgadas de distancia. Correspondía en los experimentos de Dessprèz a 600 granos obtenidos por término medio de cada grano sembrado; y una décima o undécima parte de un acre era suficiente en tal caso para cultivar los ocho bushels y medio de trigo que se requieren por término medio para el alimento anual de pan por cabeza de una población que viviría principalmente de pan.
Prof. Grandeau, Director of the French Station Agronomique de l’Est, has also made, since 1886, experiments on Major Hallett’s method, and he obtained similar results.
“In a proper soil,” he wrote, “one single grain of wheat can give as much as fifty stems (and ears), and even more, and thus cover a circle thirteen inches in diameter.”94
But as he seems to know how difficult it often is to convince people of the plainest facts, he published the photographs of separate wheat plants grown in different soils, differently manured, including pure river sand enriched by manure.95
He concluded that under proper treatment 2,000 and even 4,000 grains could be easily obtained from each planted grain. The seedlings, growing from grains planted ten inches apart, cover the whole space, and the experimental plot takes the aspect of an excellent cornfield, as may be seen from a photograph given by Grandeau in his Etudes agronomiques.96