choking the young forage plants entirely. A constant warfare was 

 waged on the pests during the entire season, and it is to be hoped 

 that they will prove less troublesome another year. 



For several reasons the conditions under which the experiments 

 of this year were carried out were far from satisfactory, a fact 

 which gives greater value to the good results obtained and no doubt 

 explains some of the failures, partial or entire. Work was not 

 begun until the end of April, and was then greatly retarded by a 

 lack of assistance and equipment, due to the insufficiency of the 

 appropriation which could be used for that purpose. The months of 

 May and June were very wet, as will be seen from the following 

 rainfall tables : 



Daily precipitation at Washington, D. C, from April to November, 1900. 

 (Data furnished by the U. S. Weather Bureau.) 



» " T " as used throughout this table denotes a trace of rainfall. 



The extremely heavy rains of May 19, June 3, and June 8 did 

 much damage. The first one, coming after the planting of a large 

 part of the higher ground, fell with such rapidity and violence as to 

 wash away both seed and soil from some plats and mix the seed on 

 several others so thoroughly as to entirely vitiate their integrity and 

 necessitate replanting. Each of these rains covered the lower field 

 with standing water several inches deep, which drained away but 

 slowly from the level land or sloping in from the river. This 

 seriously delayed the planting on that area. 



