SECRETARY'S REPORT. 91 



liable to injury from the flooding of the land by freshets. That is 

 a great merit, for these lowest portions of our river lands are sub- 

 ject to overflows, and after a winter or spring freshet, the water not 

 unfrequently remains on the land a week or fortnight at a time, and 

 sometimes before one flood has entirely subsided, another succeeds, 

 and keeps the land wet for three or four weeks. I infer that the 

 flooding is an advantage rather than otherw'ise, from the fact that 

 wherever this grass has come in of itself, it has invariably done so 

 on those portions of the meadow which are overflowed. The Fowl 

 meadow grass will last for an indefinite period. The self-seeded 

 patches in our meadow have flourished there for a long time in 

 spite of wind and tide, yielding as full and good crops now as at any 

 former period." 



Poa comjyrcssa — Wire Grass — Flat-stalked Meadow Grass — 

 Blue Grass, (not the Blue Grass of Kentucky.) This is a very 

 hardy species, growing even on the driest soils and upon rocks barely 

 covered with earth. It is readily distinguished from Poa pratensis 

 by its flattened stem and darker green color. Mr. Howard* says, 

 " It is perhaps the most nutritive grass known. All grazing animals 

 eat it with avidity, and sheep are known to fatten faster on it than 

 on any other. It shrinks less in drying than any other species, and 

 makes in proportion to its bulk the heaviest, and at the same tim,e 

 the best hay, though the yield per acre would not be large." Dr. 

 Darlington says, "cows which feed on it yield the richest milk and 

 finest butter." A serious objection to it for hay is its scanty pro- 

 duction of herbage, besides vrhich it is, in arable culture as really a 

 pest as T?'iticiim 7-cpcns, Witch grass — its creeping roots retaining 

 life with great tenacity, even under much exposure. For dry, ledo-y 

 pastures and rocky knolls never under the plow, it is a highly valu- 

 able grass. 



Poa nemoralis — Wood Meadow Grass. This is not so often met 

 with as the above named species, and has never been much cultivated. 

 It is readily eaten by cattle, and would probably succeed in moist 

 and shady places. 



Several other species of Poa are sometimes met with, among which 



* Prize Essay on Grasses. — New^York Transaction?, 1855. 



