Domestic JSTotices. 273 



Art. III. Domestic Notices. 



Gama grass (Tripsacum (^actyloides). — We observe that this grass, 

 which, en passant, has really been fodder for a long time for the editors 

 of our numerous agricultural and horticultural periodicals, has at last 

 reached England, where Loudon, in the last number of his Magazine, 

 recommends it for a trial. He, however, is quite pardonable for so doing, 

 as he has doubtless drawn his information regarding it from the Ameri- 

 can accounts. Nothing can be more nonsensical than the praises lav- 

 ished upon this grass, in our papers for the last two or three years, as a 

 crop for culture in the northern states, as all intelligent cultivators who 

 have tested it themselves are now fully aware. The gama grass, in the 

 southern states, under a burning sun, and in situations where the com- 

 mon pasture grasses of the cooler states would perish in a month, yields 

 abundant crops of coarse herbage, and is really a plant of the great- 

 est utility ; but to endeavor to cultivate it in the northern states, where 

 the finest and most nourishing grasses are indigenous or perfectly natu- 

 ralized, is something like exchanging for dry corn-stalks the first ver- 

 dant growth of red clover. It will be still more amusing and ridiculous 

 in England, where the moist climate and mild summers contribute to the 

 production of the closest and finest turf, and most tender and succulent 

 herbage for cattle, to be found in the world. — A. J. D., Botanic Garden 

 and Nursery, Newhurgh, N Y. June, 1836. 



The Crave Myrtle nearly hardy. — We have little doubt that this well- 

 known and very beautiful shrub from the East Indies, formerly treated 

 as a tender hot-house, and still as a green-house plant, will yet become 

 naturalized in the northern states. Our attention was attracted to the 

 hardiness of this shrub, by seeing one of three or four feet high in a 

 neisrhboring garden, which braved the winter of 1884, without losing but 

 half its height. A plant of several years growth, which had been 

 planted in the open ground during summer, was, last season, in the ex- 

 pectation of a mild winter, left exposed without any shelter, at this es- 

 tablishment : of course, owing to the severity of the cold (unparal- 

 lelled in duration and severity for fifty years), it was killed to the 

 ground ; but we are now gratified with the sight of an abundance of 

 thrifty shoots, which have sprung up from the roots, and are growing 

 with the greatest vigor. It can scarcely be questioned that, if planted 

 in a warm dry soil, in a sheltered situation, and protected with a cover- 

 ing of straw or mats for a few winters, this fine shrub would be enabled 

 perfectly to endure our ordinary winters, and produce annually, during 

 summer, its luxuriant clustei's of delicate pink blossoms. — lb. 



Some species of the Sedges (Carices) might, with considerable ad- 

 vantage, be introduced into our shady borders, especially in those gar- 

 dens surrounded by belts of deciduous trees, or by hedges. Carex 

 foUiculata, lupulina, hystericina, are conspicuous for their turgid 

 and nodding fruit spikes, and are uniquely elegant in their growth. 

 Huge patches of Phalaris arundinacea var. variegata, may be seen 

 thrivin'^ with a luxuriance which threatens to destroy more valuable 

 and delicate plants ; while, with the exception of the pearl-strung 

 Briza maxima, other and more interesting gramineous plants are 

 generally excluded. One of the very fii'st vernal precursors of Flora, 

 m this vicinity, is the pretty Carex marginata, so common on every 

 dry, sunny and rocky hill-side, of golden-yellow hue from its bright and 

 pendent anthers, and would fain content itself with some secluded and 

 retired, quiet nook of the garden, where, undisturbed and unvisited dur- 

 ing the more prominent reign of its gaudy sister vegetables, it should 

 VOL. II. NO. VII. 35 



