Rural School Leaflet 



941 



Questions. — In which States do we find oats most extensively grown?* 

 How does New York stand in the production of oats ? What is the value 

 in dollars of the oat crop of New York State? In 

 what parts of the State do we find the most 

 extensive oat fields? What percentage of the 

 land in your district is devoted to oat culture? 

 How many kinds of oats are there ? How many 

 kinds can you find in your neighborhood next 

 summer? 



Who grows oats most extensively in your 

 district? Is the crop sold or used at home? If 

 oats are not grown on some of the farms in your 

 neighborhood, can you find out why? What 

 effect has the kind of soil on the growing of oats? Do oats require 

 a large or small amount of moisture? 



Fig. 4. — Oat grain. 

 Kernel; b, hull 



a, 



II. TIMOTHY 



The hay crop is the most valuable single crop produced in New York 

 State. Its annual value is about $70,000,000. Altogether there is about 

 five million acres of hay in the State, and about four million acres of this 

 hay is timothy, or timothy and clover mixed; so we see that timothy is 



the most valuable of all the crops in New York. 

 The name " timothy " comes from Timothy 

 Hansen, of Maryland, who is said to have in- 

 troduced the seed from England in 1720. 

 Timothy is sometimes called Herd's grass, after 

 John Herd, who is said to have found it growing 

 wild about 1700. 



Why do we cultivate timothy? There are 

 about 1,380 species of grasses, either wild or 

 cultivated, growing in the United States, yet 

 only a few of these are cultivated to any extent. 

 How many cultivated grasses can you name or 

 collect? How many uncultivated grasses can 

 you find growing wild? 



A grass, in order to be cultivated, must have 



two important qualities: first, it must produce 



seed in abundance; and second, it must yield 



a large quantity of good forage. 



Many of our native wild grasses are excellent in every way, but produce 



such a small quantity of seed that it cannot be procured at a sufficiently 



low cost to sow meadows. A few other grasses yield plenty of seed, but 



Head of timothy 



