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Distribution of the Buffalo Grass (Buchlce dactyloides, Engeim,) 



By Dr. Valery Ha yard. 



This noted plant has long enjoyed a reputation to which it does 

 not seem to be fairly entitled. Of its qualities, as a most excel- 

 lent pasture grass, I do not wish to say a word in disparagement, 

 but, concerning its distribution, I want to call attention to what 

 IS probably a very general misconception. In the *' Flora of 

 Colorado" it is referred to as follows: ''The celebrated Buffalo 

 ^ brass, known to hunters and trappers as one of the most nutritious 



Grasses, on which for a part of the year subsist and fatten the 

 immense herds of buffalo and the cattle of the hunter and emi- 

 grant It extends on the elevated plains from the British Pos- 

 sessions southward and westward into Mexico and New Mexico." 

 Dr. Asa Gray in his paper on *' The Vegetation of the Rocky 



Mountain Remon " 



/ 



and by its abundance, is Biichloc dactyloidesr From these and 

 similar authorities the general impression prevails that the Buffalo 

 Grass is the most abundant and widespread, as well as the best, 

 grass on the broad western prairies ; that it has been the chief 

 food of the buffalo as it is now that of the immense herds of cattle 

 rangmg over those prairies. Let us see how much foundation in 

 tact there may be for such an impression. 



I have traveled on horseback over a large part of Dakota, 

 especially north and west, and always with an eye open to its bot- 

 anical resources, but have failed to discover the Buffalo Grass 

 Within its limits. Several writers make the general statement, 

 without specifying localities, that it is abundant on the Upper 

 Missouri. I have traversed the plains bordering the Missouri 

 River from Bismarck to Fort Assiniboine, and thence to Benton 

 and the Falls, but never observed it. Nor is it seen in Southern 

 Dakota, as I am informed by a reliable botanical correspondent 

 from Fort Niobrara. 



In my travels through eastern and northern Montana, I have 

 found the Buffalo Grass only at one place (on Sunday Creek near 

 Fort Keogh), in scattered patches, not sufficiently abundant to be 

 ^f practical importance. F. Lamson Scribner, in his paper on the 

 agricultural grasses of central Montana, the region " lying just 



