. Agriculture for beginners. ow do really very little harm would kill so many of theplants as to ruin the crop. What wonderful ways plants have of takingcare of themselves! Feeding Value of the Leaf. The leaves stand next to thegrain in feeding value. Cattle, horses, and sheep relish theleaves greatly, either whengreen or dried, providedthe substance has not beenwashed out of them, ashappens when the corn isleft standing to be huskedfrom the stalk, and theanimals are turned intothe field after the husk-ing is done. By that timemost of the leaves havebeen blown off and lost,and those remaining
. Agriculture for beginners. ow do really very little harm would kill so many of theplants as to ruin the crop. What wonderful ways plants have of takingcare of themselves! Feeding Value of the Leaf. The leaves stand next to thegrain in feeding value. Cattle, horses, and sheep relish theleaves greatly, either whengreen or dried, providedthe substance has not beenwashed out of them, ashappens when the corn isleft standing to be huskedfrom the stalk, and theanimals are turned intothe field after the husk-ing is done. By that timemost of the leaves havebeen blown off and lost,and those remaining havevery little of the feed-ing value they once had. The Tassel. The tas-sel is made up of a large number of flowers, but these areincomplete or really are but half flowers. The other half iswhat the farmer calls the shoot, and consists of the silk andthe ovule, the latter being finally the corn grain or kernel. For every grain there must be a silk and an ovule. Thesilk must receive from the tassel of some corn plant a grain. Fig. 13. The Kind of Tassel thatwill produce plenty of pollen 22 AGRICULTURE FOR BEGINNERS of pollen, and the contents of this pollen grain must be car-ried to the ovule ; otherwise there will be no kernel or grain(see pp. *44-*48). In most plants all the parts of the flowerare together in one blossom. This is true of wheat, oats,and kaffir. EXERCISE Remove the husks from an ear carefully, so as not to disturb thesilks, and )ou will see that for every grain on the ear there is a silk(see Fig. 14). Before the grain could form and grow it was necessary for a grain of pollen to comefrom the tassel of some stalkto every silk. How many pollen grainsdo you suppose are requiredto pollinate all the silks in thecornfield, and allow for thethousands of grains that missthe silks and fall to the ground?It is estimated that as manyas eighteen million grains maybe produced on a single tas-sel. If every stalk required athousand grains to pollinateits silks, seventeen tho
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