DESCRIPTION OF IMPORTANT GRASS FORAGE PLANTS 153 



Laboratory Work 



Suggestions to Teachers. As previously emphasized, the teacher should provide 

 the material for laboratory work and demonstration some time in advance. The 

 material for study should consist of fresh dried and alcoholic specimens. If the ground 

 around the laboratory permits, a grass garden should be started, where at least all 

 of the more important grasses used in the class work should be grown in plots. Al- 

 though most of this fresh material can be used only during the growing season, some of it, 

 especially the underground parts, can be secured if the ground is not frozen too hard 

 during the winter months. The alcoholic and dried specimens should represent 

 either whole or parts of the plants. Fruits of all the species studied should also be on 

 hand for examination. Photographs and illustrations of other kinds, wall charts and 

 maps of distribution will prove useful. Moving pictures of agricultural operations, 

 such as seed sowing, mowing, haying operations, etc., will prove of great value, if the 

 laboratory is equipped with all of these modern pieces of apparatus. As many of the 

 above mentioned grasses are cultivated in all civilized countries or have escaped from 

 cultivation the teacher, wherever he or she may be located, need not suffer for lack of 

 material. 



Laboratory Exercises 



1. Describe and draw the specimens of grasses handed to you for study. The 

 examination of the grass flower can only be accomplished successfully by the use of a 

 hand lens, or a dissecting microscope. The equipment of the laboratory presupposes 

 that each student has access to such a microscope. The dried grasses for study can be 

 mounted by the teacher on stiff card boards covered with thin sheets of gelatin, or what 

 is better the specimens themselves can be presented to the students for preservation. 



2. Each student will have assigned a single grass species to study in the field, as 

 it grows, and with reference to the literature dealing with this plant species. This 

 will necessitate reference to the books, cyclopedias, bulletins and other sources of in- 

 formation available ; n the library of the institution, or if the laboratory is in a large 

 city, the libraries of the scientific institutions which may be located there. A written 

 report should be handed to the teacher as a result of each investigation. This is a 

 piece of home work which should be a part of every course in botany, as it indicates 

 to the students the sources of the information about the plants with which the class 

 deals. It also indicates how knowledge is acquired about books and the objects of 

 nature. It trains the student for future investigation and conduces to originality. 



3. A comparative study of the grain fruits, or caryopses of the different grasses 

 should be a part of the laboratory training. The writer has used a set of six paste- 

 board cards perforated with round holes an inch in diameter. These cards are backed 

 with a stiff piece of gray pasteboard. The students are given the different agricultural 

 seed grass caryopses, leguminous, weed and poisonous seeds to the number of forty- 

 eight. These are filled into the circular holes made as above described. The eight holes 

 each with a different seed are then covered by a single piece of glass usually the size of 

 lantern slide covers. The glass is then bound to the two separate pieces of card- 

 board by passe-partout tape usually black in color. The six sets of eight seeds each 



