THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



4S7 



NOTES OX MEADOWS AND PASTURES. 



By JAMES BUCKMAN, F.G.S., F.L.S., 

 Professor of Botany and Geology at the Royal Agricultural College. 



Srdiy. — rianta which, by reason of their structure, 

 offer mechanical inconvenience to Cattle both in Hay 

 and Pasture. — In cousidering the pasture weeds of this 

 kind, we shall have by far the greater number of their 

 species of the single genus carduns, which is now made 

 to comprehend the two old genera of cardims or 

 thistle and cinicus or plume thistle, the latter differing 

 from the former in its beautifully feathered down or 

 pappus, which is simple in the carduus. It is in both 

 forms ; and, indeed, in the whole tribe of thistles, this 

 feathery down which aids so much in the extension of 

 this class of weeds. But, besides these, we have plants 

 quite different in their botany, and yet being obnoxious 

 to cattle from some mechanical arrangement, such as 

 the stings and stiff hairs in the nettles and other setose 

 plants ; as, also, the awns or beards, and the spicula or 

 the ribs and edges of the leaves of some grasses ; these 

 harder parts usually sticking in the gums, and causing 

 great irritation to the mouth. 



The following is a list of the more important weeds of 

 th's class : — 



Table III. 



■ Plants with injurious Spines, &c. 

 Mechanical Weeds. 



Botanical Name. 

 Carduus nutans. . 



acanthoides 

 eriophorus', 

 lanceolatua. 



„ palustria . . 

 „ praCeosis . . 



„ acaulia .... 

 Carlina vulgaris . . 



Urtica dioica .... 



Trivial Name. 

 Musk thiatle j 



Welted thiatle 



Cotton thistle .... 

 Spear thistU .... 



Com thiatle | 



Marsh plume thistle J 

 Meadow plume do.l 



StemlesB thiatle 

 Carliue thiatle 



Stinging nettle 

 Hordeum murinnm Wall barley 



.hiatle .. J 

 iatle. ... 1 



Remarks. 



Mostly a weed of 

 " seeds." 



Moatly in the 

 hedge - row or 

 bordora of fields, 

 the latter in- 

 clining to the 

 open meadows. 



Principally a weed 

 of "aeeds." 



Damp or marshy 

 meadows ; river 

 flats, in good but 

 moiat paitures. 



Poor uplands — 

 uaually in calca- 

 reoua soils. 



Everywhere. 



All grasaea with 

 bearded flowers 

 or rough leavea. 



An examination of the thistles will show us that in 

 them we have plants of different degrees of endurance ; 

 most of them are biennial, in which case the plant is pro- 

 duced in one season : it then withstands the cold of our 

 most rigorous winter, and shoots up its flowery stems, 

 and developes itp -eds the next year, when it dies. Of 

 this kind the cardxius mitans is a good example. 

 Others are perennial, in as far as the rootstock is con- 

 cerned ; but the leaves die down annually, which in 

 fact is also, so far, the history of the nettle. 



Now, as regards the biennial forms of thistles, we 

 annt ««« tbftt to have it in our crops, whether of na- 



tural or artificial meadows, to any extent argues great 

 carelessness, as its first year of growth is suflScient for 

 its detection, atid if cut up then beloio the crown it is 

 not only itself killed, but all hope of a future progeny 

 is thus avoided. Still, we have this week seen a patch 

 of seeds in which half the mass was cardims nutans, 

 and under such circumstances as clearly show the man- 

 ner in which they are propagated by the farmers, for by 

 his care and ctirelessness the farmer is truly a %veed 

 nurseryman, though it is true that if a bailiff advertised 

 for a place as a weed propagator, he would not expect 

 readily to get one. 



Now, in the case before us we had 

 1. 2. 



Field of old sueiis 

 full of bunches of 

 carduus nutans com- 

 ing on to flower. 



Field of last year's 

 sown seeds also full of 

 the same thistle as 1, 

 and in the same con- 

 dition. 



In the first field were about a dozen people cutting up 

 the thistles . this, however, might have been done by 

 the plough, and its tillage would be advanced at the 

 same time. 



Now, in this case, we have only to suppose that the 

 thistle was originally sown either with the "seeds," or 

 from the neglected road-side, or from a dirty neighbour, 

 and as the seeds are seldom or never weeded they 

 seeded on the ground, and in suflScient quantity to be 

 at present so vastly conspicuous as to force themselves 

 upon the attention, and we can easily understand how 

 a small beginning may cause such great results if we 

 bear in mind the great fecundity of some of these plants ; 

 as thus, we have counted the following amount of seeds 

 in single plants of the under-mentioned species, and as 

 opportunity offers we shall be sure of quite as great re- 

 sults on examining the others : 



Table IV. 

 Seed Development of Thistles. 



■ One plant seeding covered a garden of two acres in a single 

 year, 



I I 



