TRIDEA. 59 
flowering begins in August, and usually lasts at least two months, the 
capsules continuing to ripen until November or December, before which 
time the leaves have died down. The seeds germinate mostly early in the 
following season when the soil is moist; some may retain their vitality 
apparently for a few years in the soil. 
The ripe corms when crushed yield relatively large amounts of fini 
qualitv starch. They are eaten by pigs and cockatoos, which in some 
parts have cleared whole districts more or less thoroughly. 
Eradication.—The plant is a sun-loving one, preferring hard, dry, 
more or less bare, unshaded ground, vegetating in winter time and resting 
during summer. Poisons are utterly useless, as with nearly all weeds. 
Cultivation soon suppresses it, winter wheat, followed by farmyard 
manure and potatoes, being especially good for the first two years; but 
a green fodder crop is equally good if it is up early in the year, and stands 
over winter. Fencing off and resting a portion of the pasture each winter 
will aid the grasses greatly in suppressing the weed. The treading of 
stock on wet ground is very bad for any pasture, if the soil is given no 
chance to loosen out and become porous again. The spread and damage 
done by this weed is mainly due to improper pasturage methods. All 
continually grazed and cropped pastures steadily deteriorate, especially 
when the practice is added of collecting and carrying away the droppings 
to cultivated land, instead of spreading the droppings and loosening the 
soil by the aid of scarifiers. Pasture land which is divided into paddocks 
by good wind-proof hedges, rested from time to time, enriched’ with humus 
instead of being robbed of it, and kept open and pervious by the use 
of scarifiers, will not be troubled by onion grass to any great extent, will 
have a less tendency to become tussocky, especially if occasionally mown, 
and will carry twice the amount of stock that one large paddock under con- 
tinuous grazing would do. Further, the difference in carrying power will 
be even more pronounced in times of drought than in good seasons. 
When the leaves are quite young, stock will browse on the onion grass, 
but they are not fond of it, and as soon as the leaves become adult they 
are so tough and wiry that the stock often pull up the sods, or draw out 
their own teeth. Statements are current that lambs eating the leaves 
become paralysed, and that cockatoos, after eating the underground corms, 
become stupified as with a narcotic, but the statements lack scientific con- 
firmation, and appear to be based on scanty and not altogether trustworthy 
evidence. Experimental tests are needed. 
Stock Roads and Waste Places.—The latter should wherever possible 
be covered with trees, preferably quickly growing - and closely planted 
timber trees. The same applies to the former, except that in many cases 
closely planted acacias would be preferable. ‘They suppress the weed 
completely, give shade and protection without overshadowing the road too 
much, yield useful products, bark, and wood, and add greatly to the 
beauty of the roads. 
Lawns and Cricket Grounds.—Frequent and close cutting during the 
growing period, and as long as any flowers appear (May-October) will 
exhaust the underground corms, and prevent the formation of fresh seed. 
If the ground is trodden and baked hard by trampling in all weathers, it 
must be loosened, a top-dressing of well-rotted stable manure applied, and 
not rolled too heavily. Romulea does not like light, porous ground fairly 
rich in humus. It prefers ground which is dry in summer time but moist 
in winter. 
Parasites—A fairy ring fungus which forms brown irregular circles 
in the grass, also grows on and destroys the bulbs, but they soon reappear 
in the grass behind the rings, and the fungus does more harm to the 
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