228 SOUTHERN FIELD CROPS 



curing in the shade produces the toughness of kernel necessary to 

 withstand the milling processes. In the shock every head should 

 be shaded and sheltered from storm as much as possible. The 

 rice should be left in the shock until the straw is cured and the 

 rice is hard." (S. A. Knapp, in Farmer's Bui. No. 110, U. S. 

 Dept. of Agr.) 



Threshing is done in the same way as with other grains, 

 usually in Louisiana, du:ectly from the shock. The rough rice, 

 usually in bags or barrels of 162 pounds, is sold to the rice 

 mills. 



Rough rice weighs 45 pounds per bushel and yields about half 

 its weight of marketable rice, besides cracked rice, poUsh, and 

 other by-products. 



A fair yield in irrigated regions is 10 to 18 barrels or bags per 

 acre. 



207. Weeds. — The rice planter encounters his great- 

 est difficulties through the invasion of the field by a mul- 

 titude of troublesome weeds. The general methods of 

 control are plowing at opportune times and flooding. The 

 most troublesome weed is red rice. 



Red rice is frequently accidentally sown with seed rice. It is a 

 strain different from the types of rice cultivated in the United 

 States and comes only from red rice seed ; but this plant is capable 

 of crossing with cultivated rice. A method recommended for 

 ridding the land of this and of other weeds is to plow the field 

 soon after harvest, so as to cause the seed of red rice and of 

 other weeds to germinate. The young weeds are then killed by 

 frost, or, in some cases, mowed and burned. 



Another method of fighting true weeds, other than red rice and 

 other members of the grass family, consists in mowing the mass of 

 young rice and weeds in the late spring or early summer, with the 

 expectation that the rice will then develop a central shoot while 

 the weeds wiU not make further growth. 



Early spring plomng is sometimes practiced to induce the weed 

 seeds to germinate ; the young plants are then killed by culti- 



