THE WHEAT-FIELD 203 



and at this operation no less than fifteen per cent, 

 of the bulk is screened out. If the average weed 

 seed is only a third the size of the wheat, this 

 means that nearly every other seed in the sample 

 that reaches the miller will produce a weed 

 instead of wheat when it is sown. Needless to 

 say, samples for seed have to be cleaner than 

 that, but in spite of every care some seed is 

 inevitably drilled in with the wheat. 



Other weeds and more of them get into the 

 field with the manure. It has, no doubt, rotted 

 and heated in the cow-sheds and elsewhere be- 

 fore it is spread on the fields and ploughed in. 

 Before that, if it reached the cows in the form of 

 hay, it was hastened into premature germination 

 by the heat of the stack, was scorched and wilted 

 by the same heat, swallowed and digested by the 

 cattle, decimated over and over again by dangers 

 more or less unknown to seeds in a wild state. 

 Yet if even one per cent, is able to run the gauntlet 

 and reach the arable land, it will very soon account 

 for a great robbing of the legitimate crops. I 

 think it will be seen, however, in most districts 

 that few weeds found on the arable land are of 

 the same kind as those that grow in the hay-fields. 



The worst weed in the wheat-field is the cooch, 

 cutch, or twitch, a wiry insinuating weed that it 

 is almost impossible to eradicate. It takes its 

 roots six feet down in stiff clay. If you cut off 

 and burn all but the last inch, that inch will find 

 its way to the surface and continue the war. In a 



