Abstract

The safflower is an oil-seed crop belonging to the natural order Compositae. This was once grown extensively in Bengal, United Provinces, the Punjab, Bombay and the Central Provinces for the extraction of an yellow dye, carthamin, from the florets of this plant, but with the introduction of synthetic dyes, this industry has ceased to exist, and the importance of this crop has very much dwindled. It is now grown merely for the sake of its oil. The seeds when crushed yield a clear straw- coloured oil which is largely used for culinary purposes. In the Madras Presidency this crop is cultivated chiefly in the black soils of the Ceded Districts, the largest area being in the Bellary district. Little known outside the Ceded Districts it does not find a place in the Season and Crop Report of this Province. This crop is sown in October November and is har- vested by February. It is usually sown as a mixture with coriander, sorghum or wheat. As a pure crop it is sown only along the borders of fields where its spiny bracts serve as a protection against cattle trespass. The literature regarding this crop is rather scanty. The earliest refer- ence is in the Commercial Products of India, Watt (1908), where a general account of this crop is given and the existence of two types of plants, the spinose and the spineless, is recognised. Howard et al (1915) published detailed descriptions of 34 types. Subsequently Sabnis and Phatak (1935) have made a classified list of 63 types, based on the flower colours and on the nature and shape of bracts. At the Agricultural Research Station, Hagari, selection work on this crop has been in progress for some time and the mode of inheritance of a few plant characters has also been studied incidentally. The results obtained are recorded in this paper.

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