THE MONTHLY BULLETIN. 31 



SOME NOTES ON WEEDS 



By O. "W. Newman. 



If you take a trip through Southern California in the spring you will 

 find the fields yellow with a beautiful growth of wild mustard, or purple 

 and white with the ever thrifty wild radish. Fields once bearing stands 

 of pure golden grain now bear a mixture of golden grain and mustard, 

 or are given over altogether to the weed. On one field in Ventura 

 County in 1909 the owner, deciding that the mustard was the stronger 

 crop, sowed the seed of a commercial variety and harvested it in the fall. 



Mustard is not a pest in the sense that it is hard to eradicate. Care 

 and cultivation will keep it under control, and yet today, with all that 

 has been said on the question of weeds, you will find hundreds of acres 

 of good grain land covered with it. What does it mean? The answer 

 is short — poor management. It means, also, that the balance of strength 

 in the struggle for existence is leaving the cultivated crop to the ad- 

 vantage of the weeds, which will grow better without cultivation. All 

 plants, including weeds, settle and thrive where the struggle for exis- 

 tence is such that they can enter it and prosper. 



A good stand of grass leaves no chance for weeds. If the conditions 

 for the least crop production are maintained, the weeds will disappear. 

 Keep the land busy with good crops. There is no surer sign of lack of 

 good management than a weed infested farm. And if a farmer asks, as 

 he often does : ' ' How can I get rid of the weeds ? ' ' answer him without 

 hesitation: "Use better methods, change your system, give the crops a 

 better opportunity and the Aveeds less ; practice rotation, or a dozen other 

 methods." "What is needed is not a formula, but a little head work. 

 The one good thing the weeds can accomplish is to prove by their pres- 

 ence that there is a weak point in the established system of agriculture. 



To get rid of the weeds after a corn crop has been harvested, sow 

 cowpeas, or some other leguminous crop. This not only eliminates the 

 weeds, but serves as fi good fertilizer, since it returns nitrogen and 

 organic matter to the soil. The seed should, however, be thoroughly 

 tested before it is purchased, to insure its freedom from weed seeds. 

 With nearly 230,000 seeds in one pound of alfalfa, the smallest per cent 

 of seeds of a dangerous weed contained therein would mean great dam- 

 age. 



All grain and cover crop seeds should be treated to rigid test before 

 using, for Russian thistle, tumbleweed. cocklebur, star thistle, mustard, 

 and other weeds grown in grain, are harvested and sent over the country 

 by careless farmers, to make trouble. AVherever the Russian thistle 

 occurs it should be cut long before it matures, for it has a rolling habit 

 and if allowed to go too long before cutting will be rolled by the wind 

 over the country, scattering mature seeds as it goes. It is a very per- 

 sistent grower and is a very real growing menace. 



Weeds are harmful in four Avays : first, they reduce the supply of 

 available plant food which should go to producing a valuable crop ; 

 second, they use up the moisture which should be stored in the soil ; 

 third, they destroy the fertility of the soil ; fourth, they lower the 

 value of the land. 



