REPORT ON GRASSES AND FORAGE PLANTS. 1838 
will be remembered, all this atmosnheric and mineral food, which has 
_ been assimilated and stored up in the roots and stems of clover remains 
to furnish an abundant supply, by its decay, to the crop which shall 
succeed it, and thus clover or similar plants have always played a most 
important part in all systems of rotation, as in the wheat-growing region 
of the Genesee Valley of New York. In this Desmodium we have a 
plant which appears to be a substitute for clover and to possess this 
great advantage, viz: that it will flourish vigorously upon certain lands 
upon which a crop of clover cannot be secured. This seems to be espe- 
cially true of the sand barrens of the Atlantic seaboard. Certainly if 
the statements made concerning it are to be credited, it is destined to 
effect a revolution in agriculture throughout this section, and to restore 
to fertility lands which have been practically abandoned by the farmer. 
RICHARDSONIA SCABRA—Mexican clover. 
a 
This is an annual plant of the Natural Order Rubiacez, which contains 
the coffee, cinchona, and ipecacuanha plants. Itis a native of Mexico 
and South America, and has within a few years become extensively 
naturalized in some parts of the South. Under favorable circumstances 
it grows rapidly, with succulent, spreading, leafy stems, which bear the 
small flowers in heads or clusters at the ends of the branches and in the 
axils of the leaves. The flowers are funnel-form, white, about half an 
inch long, with 4 to 6 narrow lobes, and an equal number of stamens 
inserted on the inside of the corolla tube. The stem is somewhat hairy, 
the leaves opposite, and, like other plants of this order, connected at the 
base by stipules or sheaths. The leaves are oblong or elliptical and one 
or two inches long. Mr. John M. McGehee, Milton, Fla., writes as 
follows: , 
I send you a small sample cf what we here call Florida Clover, others call it Water 
Parsley, and others Bell Fountain. This plant is now attracting more interest in this 
section than any other article of farming interest. It is very troublesome to farmers in 
the cultivation of their crops; its growth is very rapid. It contains a great deal of 
water, and is hard to cure asa hay. Some call it very good hay, others say it is worth- 
less. For the last 50 years it has been regarded as a great pest to farmers. It is now 
coming into notice as an element in green-soiling, which has never been practiced in 
this section before. 
Mr. Matt. Coleman, Leesburg, Sumter County, Florida, writes as 
follows: 
Linclose a specimen of a plant called Spanish Clover. The tradition is that when 
the Spanish evacuated Pensacola this plant was discovered there by the cavalry horses 
feeding upon it eagerly. Five years ago, hearing of it, I procured some of the seed 
and have been planting or cultivating it in my orange grove from that time to the 
present as a forage plant and vegetable fertilizer. I find it ample and sufiicient. It 
grows‘on thin pine land from four to six feet, branches and spreads in every direction, 
forming a thick matting and shade to the earth, and affords all the mulching my trees 
require. One hand can mow as much in one day as a horse will eat in a year; two 
days’ sun will cure it ready for housing or stacking, and it makes a sweet, pleasant- 
flavored hay; horses and cattle both relish it. 'The bloom is white, always open in 
the morning and closed im the evening. Bees and all kinds of butterflies suck the 
bleom. 
This plant was breught to the attention of the department in 1874, - 
and samples for analysis were sent from Mobile by Mr. Chas. Mobr and 
by Dr. J. F. B. Rohmer. Mr, Mohr’s account of it and the chemical 
analysis made by Dr. McMurtrie were published in the annual report for - 
that year. Mr. Chas. Mohr recently says of this plant: 
Along the seaboard of this State the so-called Mexican Clover is found spreading ex- 
tensively; it covers the sandy upland soils completely with its prostrate, succulent, 
