DACTYUS GLOMERATA, L., ORCHARD GRASS 107 



late years I have harvested from 75 to 100 acres of this crop 

 annually. I make it a rule to start the harvester into it when 

 the early heads begin to shell at the tips. The straw of most of 

 it is then quite green, and if carefully i)ut up, makes fair feed 

 for stock after threshing. If cut before fully ripe, much care 

 must be taken in shocking, or there will be a great loss of seed in 

 threshing, for this reason : When Timothy is ripe, the cell whicli 

 holds the seed opens. If cut too green and the bundles are left 

 exposed to the sun, the straw dries like hay, these small cells do 

 not open, and no machine can knock tlie seed out of them. If 

 cut before fully ripe this difficulty may be largely overcome by 

 putting in round shocks as soon as cut, packing the bundles close 

 together to exclude the air. In this condition the natural pro- 

 cess of ripening will go on ; but if set up two and two, as many 

 set the bundles, it will dry and stop at the same stage as when 

 cut. A good crop of Timothy should give eight bushels to the 

 acre. I have had more, and also less. As a farm crop there is 

 more uncertainty in saving it than others grains. It must stand 

 in the shock at least two weeks to be dry enough for threshing. 

 During that time, if heavy rains and high winds occur, there will 

 be considerable waste in the shock. The less the bundles are 

 handled after drying, the less waste. Hence I thresh it directly 

 from the shock. All separators are now made with sieves for 

 cleaning this crop.'* 



DACTYLI8, L. 



Spikelets several-flowered, laterally compressed, nearly sessile, 

 crowded in dense one-sided fascicles, at the end of the branches, 

 forming a one-sided panicle. Flowers all perfect, or the upper- 

 most one staminate. Empty glumes unequal, mcmb'-anous, 

 keeled, the upper one larger, 3-nerved. The floral glume 

 larger than the empty glumes, cartilaginous, keeled, 5-nerved; 

 awn short, scabrid, Palea 2-fid, nerves ciliate. Lodicules 2, 



