300 GRASSES OF IOWA. 



it produces loco poisoning. Rattlebox {Crotalaria sagittalis L.) 

 occurs in the sandy bottoms of the Missouri river. Complaints 

 have frequently been made of the trouble it causes when fed to 

 horses. The disease it produces has been called "crotalism. " 



Present and future conditions of Iowa pastures. — As has been 

 said before, the native prairie turf is rapidly diminishing in 

 Iowa, and it is no longer a great factor in the production of 

 beef. In a valuable paper on the subject of the forage condi- 

 tions of the prairie region, Mr. Jared G. Smith* says: " The 

 amount of raw prairie land suitable for farming is rapidly 

 becoming less, and before we have converted all of it into 

 plowed land let us consider whether such a course is most 

 advisable. There is no longer any large tract of unbroken 

 prairie east of the Mississippi river. The prairies are now con- 

 fined to the Dakotas, southern Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, 

 Kansas, Oklahoma, Indian Territory and Texas. In all these 

 statss the richest of the prairies have been converted into 

 wheat, corn, or cotton fields, to add their products to the con- 

 gested condition of the world's markets. " 



The prairie lands remaining in Iowa make fine hay and 

 afford good pasturage. Many of the species are highly nutri- 

 tious and valuable in their places. This is especially true of 

 blue joint grass {Andropogon 2^'>'ovincialis), which covered 

 millions of acres of our broad fields. For many years the 

 practice of breaking up these wild meadows and planting with 

 corn, oats at d wheat has been followed, with the result that 

 our markets have frequently been overstocked with these 

 cereals. The phenomenal shortage of the cereal crops in 1897 

 has stimulated farmers to put more fields into these crops, 

 with the inevitable results. to follow — stagnation. The ques- 

 tion has been well stated by Jared G. Smith :t " It has been 

 demonstrated, both by experiment and practice, that the farmer 

 who sells beef, pork and mutton that he has produced from the 

 corn and grass raised and fed on the farm, makes more money 

 per acre of his land and per dollar of his capital than the one 

 who grows only wheat or corn or cotton. It is not necessary 

 to entirely discontinue raising these crops, but if we are to 

 produce a surplus to be sold in foreign markets, it is best to 

 export that surplus in the most condensed and marketable 

 form, as meat and animal products, that the people want to 



•Yearbook D. 9. Dept. Agrl. 1895: 310. 

 tl. c. 311. 



