528 PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. [1885. 



of self-drying or curing, so as to be available for pasturage in the win- 

 ter."* This property of self-curing is well worthy of consideration. It 

 enables cattle to find ample food during the winter by roaming at free- 

 dom, without shelter, over the vast western table-lands, where they are 

 rapidly increasing, taking the place of the nearly extinct buffalo. It 

 renders the raising of sheep particularly remunerative in Arizona and 

 Western Texas, where frost and snow are rare. 



According to General Alvord, quoted by Dr. Yasey, grasses are self- 

 cured only on plains and plateaus 3,000 feet or more above sea-level. 

 The Staked Plains and most of the prairie lands west of the Pecos are 

 at or above that elevation, but the greater part of the pasturage east 

 of the Pecos and south of Austin is below it ; and yet it can hardly be 

 denied that the grasses of this lower region, even those of Southeastern 

 Texas between the Nueces and the Rio Grande, are also capable of the 

 autumnal drying, which makes them available for winter grazing. On 

 the very coast, two or three hundred feet above sea level, between San 

 Diego and Corpus Christi. are large herds of cattle and flocks of sheep, 

 which duriug the winter get no other food than the native grasses of 

 the prairie. It seems, therefore, that elevation, although an ordinary, 

 is not a necessary factor in the process under consideration, and that 

 the degree of atmospheric dryness required for its (perhajis less perfect) 

 accomplishment can exist at low altitudes. 



Among the many excellent grasses clothing the vast prairies of South 

 and West Texas the Gramas, owing to their abundance and nutritive 

 qualities, stand pre-eminent. Of the ten species collected the following 

 are most worthy of note : 



Common or Blue Grama [Bonteloua oligostachya) ) grows everywhere 

 throughout Texas, wherever grass can fairly grow — in thrifty, dense 

 patches on low prairies, thin and sparse on alkali flats and rocky slopes. 

 It forms a large proportion of the hay delivered at the various military 

 posts and stage stations, and is considered the best obtainable. It 

 cures itself in the most perfect way, so that, although often dead and 

 dry on the parched prairie, it suffers no loss of properties. Analysis 

 (Rothrock, Bot. West of the One Hundredth Meridian) shows that it 

 contains comparatively little water and fiber, a large quantity of sugar 

 or sugar-forming material, fat, and aqueous extract. 



Black Grama (7^. hirsuta); hardly distinguishable from the last in 

 appearance, and equally good ; found with it in many places, but in 

 much less abundance. 



Tall Grama {B. racemosa)-, grows sparsely with the two preceding 

 species, but is inferior to them in quality. 



Many-eared Grama {B. polystachya) ; small, slender grass of good 

 quality, common in thin, scattered bunches on the arid bluffs of the 

 Eio Grande, trom El Paso to Eagle Pass and Laredo. 



Woolly-jointed Grama {B. eriopoda) ; tall and thrifty, forming dense 



* The Agricultural Grasses of the United States, by Dr. George Vasey. 



