576 FORAGE PLANTS AND THEIR CULTURE 



690. Spurrey (Spergula saliva}. Cultivated spurrey 

 has been much confused with the very similar corn 

 spurrey (Spergula arvensis). The latter is generally in- 

 troduced in America as a rather harmless weed in culti- 

 vated soil. Common spurrey was cultivated for forage 

 in Europe in 1566 and probably much earlier. 



Spurrey is much employed as a catch crop and for 

 green manure on sandy lands in north central Europe, 

 especially France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Denmark 

 and Russia. It is adapted to a moist, cool growing season, 

 and under such conditions will produce a crop of green 

 fodder 12 to 14 inches high in 7 or 8 weeks. Three crops 

 may thus be grown on the same piece of land in a season, 

 the first being sown as soon as danger of frost is over; 

 or one crop may be grown after a crop of winter grain is 

 harvested and before another is planted. It is often sown 

 with a grain crop in spring, and after it has grown in the 

 stubble, used as pasture. If sown alone, it is cut when in 

 bloom and fed green or cured into hay, the latter being 

 rather difficult, as the plant is quite succulent. The value 

 of spurrey for sandy lands in Europe is so great that 

 some writers have called it the " clover of sandy soils." 



Spurrey has often been tested in America, beginning 

 with 1853, but thus far it has been but little used. One 

 crop can be grown in early spring and another in fall if 

 the frosts are not too early. The plant languishes, how- 

 ever, in our hot midsummers, to which it is not adapted. 

 Young plants do not withstand frost, but when well 

 grown ordinary frosts are not .injurious. 



The most extensive investigations were those conducted 

 on the sandy Jack pine land of Michigan. The results 

 reported were very promising, but the culture of the crop 

 does not seem to have become established. At Grayling, 



