SECRETARY'S KEPORT, 107 



difference. One other consideration should be mentioned : the de- 

 sirableness of leaving the plant when cut in the condition promising 

 the greatest future usefulness. Many species of grasses may be cut 

 •with impunity at any stage ; but as already noticed, with regard to 

 Timothy, (Ilerdsgrass,) page 84, and such may possibly be the case 

 "with some others, there seems reason to believe that unless a certain 

 stage of maturity be reached, the bulb or tuber at the bottom, may 

 be weakened, and if drouth follows, perhaps killed. But in this 

 connexion, it should not be forgotten, that in all herbaceous vegeta- 

 tion there is a tendency to die, wholly, or in part, on the produc- 

 tion of seed. Thus annuals die at once, when they have attained 

 the end of their growth, namely, seed for the reproduction of their 

 species ; and in many of them their duration may be continued for 

 an indefinite period, by preventing this consummation. It is a com- 

 mon practice among gardeners in cultivating the annual mignonette, 

 when a durable plant is desired, to deprive it of its flower-buds, as 

 often as they appear. By so doing, the plant assumes the appear- 

 ance of a woody shrub, and will live for three or four years, dying, 

 however, after being allowed to produce seed. 



Winter wheat which has been repeatedly cut down during its first 

 summer's growth, has been known to survive the following winter 

 and to produce a tolerable crop the summer after. The results of 

 such experiments show that not allowing seeding in due season has 

 a tendency to prolong the duration of life in plants ; and it is upon 

 this principle that by pasturing meadows they will maintain a con- 

 tinuous production of herbage, when were they cropped for hay they 

 would fail, and this the more rapidly in proportion as the grass was 

 older before being cut. So that, as a general rule, it is bad prac- 

 tice not to make hay early. Otherwise what is gained in cjuantity 

 is mostly prejudiced in quality, and the after consequences are 

 always unfavorable, circumstances arising not solely from the impov- 

 erishment of the soil.* 



I have dwelt upon the proper period for cutting, longer than 

 otherwise might seem expedient, partly from a conviction that in the 

 State at large far greater loss is sustained by too late than by too 

 early cutting, and partly in view of the fact that improved facilities 



* Buckman. 



