Grasses for Permanent Pasture 



per acre, and would, in course of the first 

 season, closely cover the whole surface; while, 

 in mixture with other grasses newly sown, at 

 one yard apart, the planting would amount to 

 little more than a single day's wages of an 

 ordinary labourer — no great cost, considering 

 the advantages that would accrue from a 

 liberal introduction of the spiked Fescue, 

 either into irrigated grass lands, or the damp 

 hollow parts of ornamental parks. Grown at 

 Woburn, on a rich brown loam, the F. loliacea 

 is reported to have produced 16,335 lb. of 

 newly cut grass per acre, which lost 9188 lb. 

 in drying, thus leaving 7147 lb. as the 

 Aveight of hay; while the grass of the latter- 

 math was 3403 lb. per acre. 



SEED AND SOWIXC. 



Although F. loliacea is a name which fre- 

 quently appears in seed catalogues, it is only 

 applicable to a variety of the F. pratensis 

 (see p. 58), the present species being, as 

 before noticed, incapable of producing seed, 

 or at least we have never, by long and fre- 

 quent observation, been able to discover a 

 single fertile seed upon it, either when grow- 

 ing naturallv or under cultivation. 



CHE>.nCAL ANALYSIS. 



Not being among those grasses analysed 

 by Professor Way, Ave can only give the less 

 satisfactory results recorded in the " Hortus 

 Gramineus Woburnensis." When grown on a 

 rich brown loam, the yield of nutritive'matter 

 was, when flowering, at the rate of 765 lb. 

 II oz. per acre, only 553 lb. when thef straw 

 assumed a ripened-like appearance, and about 

 66^ lb. from the latter-math. 



VARIETIES. 



There are none of any agricultural import- 

 ance, the F. loliacea of the seed shops being 

 more correctly associated with F, pratensis 

 (see p. 58). Parnell, in his " Grasses of 

 Britain," has figured and described two 

 varieties under the names of Bucetum loliaceum 

 longiglume, and B. 1. eiongatum ; but we take 

 the first of them to be the true Festuca loliacea, 

 whereas we look upon his B. loliaceum as 

 identical with the F. pratensis spurea (p. 58). 

 His B. 1. eiongatum is described as differing 

 from B. 1. longiglume in the large glume or 

 calyx-chaff being shorter, concave, and five- 

 ribbed; and from his B. loliaceum in the 

 spikelets being longer, and the v/hole plant 

 much taller. 



