Farm grasses of the United States; a practical treatise on the grass crop, seeding and management of meadows and pastures, descriptions of the best varieties, the seed and its impurities, grasses for special conditions, etc., etc . atedly urged upon thefarmer by agricultural writers, but the farmer, for themost part, has just as persistently refused to grow grass also illustrates another fa<ft—namely, thata grass may have many excellent qualities, and yet beoutclassed by other grasses because of one or two appar-ently minor faults. We have seen that blue-grass, inspite of its low yi
Farm grasses of the United States; a practical treatise on the grass crop, seeding and management of meadows and pastures, descriptions of the best varieties, the seed and its impurities, grasses for special conditions, etc., etc . atedly urged upon thefarmer by agricultural writers, but the farmer, for themost part, has just as persistently refused to grow grass also illustrates another fa<ft—namely, thata grass may have many excellent qualities, and yet beoutclassed by other grasses because of one or two appar-ently minor faults. We have seen that blue-grass, inspite of its low yield, its failure in midsummer, andthe difficulty of securing a sod of it, is still the greatpasture-grass in this country (in the North), becauseof its palatability, its high nutritive quality, its in-crease of yield with age, and the pleasing appearanceof the sward. Orchard-grass is the earliest grass to start up inspring, remains green during long, hot summers andlate into the fall; it furnishes abundant feed, and isfairly well liked by stock; but it grows in tussocks,and therefore does not make an even sod. It mustalso be cut promptly when grown for hay, or its qual-ity rapidly deteriorates. The seed is also FIG. 31—ORCHARD-GRASS 156 FARM GRASSES OP THE UNITED STATES These faults seem to be at the basis of the aversionwhich most farmers in the timothy region have forthis grass. There is really no good reason why theseed should cost more than blue-grass seed, exceptthat the supply of it is more limited. It producesan abundance of good seed (fifteen to eighteenbushels per acre, according to Prof. H. J. Waters, ofthe Missouri Experiment Station), and it is easilyharvested. If this grass were grown as plentifully astimothy the seed would probably be nearly as cheap. At present orchard-grass seed is produced in quan-tity only in the highlands of western Virginia andcontiguous regions, and in two counties on the OhioRiver—one in Indiana, and the other opposite, i
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectgrasses, bookyear1905
