520 The Natural History of British Grasses. 



A. avenaceum — oat-like grass — a tall species, growing much 

 after the manner of the oat, to which its trivial name of oat-like 

 has reference ; both its culms and aftermath are usually produced 

 in abundance ; but it possesses an exceedingly bitter taste ; and 

 though Sinclair says "it is eaten by all sorts of cattle," yet we 

 have uniformly noticed that cows and sheep refuse it unless 

 starved to it by want of something better. " It contains too large 

 a proportion of bitter extractive and saline matter to warrant its 

 cultivation without a considerable admixture of different grasses ; 

 and the same objection extends to its cultivation in permanent 

 pasture," according to the author just quoted ; but as he finds it 

 " always present in the composition of the best natural meadows," 

 so he concludes that it should have a place in the list of species 

 for the laying down of permanent pastures. However, from a 

 long observation of this grass, both in separate plots and in the 

 meadow, we are inclined to think that it would be better to dis- 

 courage its growth ; it may indeed be seen in the good meadow, 

 but it is best grown in the worst parts thereof, and, from the 

 peculiarity of its constitution, it is capable of adapting itself to a 

 wide range of circumstances, and hence the universality of its 

 occurrence. We have two distinct forms, and, under constant 

 conditions, permanent varieties, namely, the typical A. avenaceum 

 in deep and moist soils, and the curious variety bulbosum in 

 sandy lands. The former of these has a swelling at its lower 

 node ; but as in its locality there is always sufficient and regu- 

 larly supplied sustenance and moisture, there is no need lor the 

 nodular growth assumed by the var. bulbosum when growing in 

 sands, and provided as a storehouse of food for its living on in 

 those periods of drought with which arid sands are mostly 

 affected at some season or other. 



These bulbs, which are the ordinary nodes of the grass much 

 enlarged, look like a string of onions on a small scale, which has 

 given rise to its popular name of onion couch ; and upon the sand- 

 beds upon which rest a great part of the towns of Gloucester and 

 Cheltenham, and on the broken-down sandstone of the new red 

 about Worcester, or the silicious drifts and soils of other dis- 

 tricts, it sometimes forms a most troublesome weed, as each node 

 is capable of growing a distinct plant, and so succulent are these 

 that heat and dryness have even less chance of killing it than the 

 common couch ; the only way to get rid of it is to hand-pick it 

 after repeated ploughing and harrowing. 



It may be supposed that the var. bulbosum would be a useful 

 grass on sands ; but as its propensity is to increase by roots, and 

 it sends up no second growth of culm, as does the A. avenaccumy 

 its yield of herbage is not half that of the true species ; its bul- 

 bous growth, however, is large and rapid, and its knotted onion- 



