236 TwENTY-FmsT Biennial Eepoet 



vide most of the forage used throughout the world. It 

 is questionable, indeed, if we could continue long on this 

 earth if both families were suddenly removed and ren- 

 dered forever extinct. These families, as you already 

 know, are, first, the great grass family, and second, the 

 equally great clover family. 



To bring clearly before you the immense value of 

 the grass family to us, I want to remind you of a few 

 important grasses. Com, wheat and oats have already 

 been mentioned; they are true grasses. Eice is a typi- 

 cal grass. E-ye, barley, all the miUets, kafifir corn, sorg- 

 hum, (the cane from which sugar is made farther south), 

 timothy, blue grass, red-top, Bermuda grass, are all 

 famUiar examples of the same family. The bamboo of 

 India and other eastern countries is a most valuable 

 building material, and many of the dwellings, all of them 

 in some sections, are constructed of the stems of these 

 giant grasses. They make beautiful and very durable 

 furniture; also, are employed in making ladders, rafts, 

 arrows, fishing rods, etc., and besides on rare occasions, 

 when they produce seed, furnish man a wholesome food. 

 Bamboo in large sections of the east is the most valuable 

 plant known, and is a true grass. 



A more familiar standard of measuring values may 

 help a little further in grasping the importance of 

 grasses to us. 



We do not grow much rice compared with eastern 

 countries, the $16,624,000, at which the 1910 rice crop of 

 the United States was valued, being a relatively insigni- 

 ficant matter when all our crops are considered. Yet 

 rice feeds about one-third of mankind, and the yearly 

 product of Japan, China and India amounts to about 

 100,000,000 tons. 



Let us consider some familiar grass crops of real 

 value in the United States. Our com crop furnished 

 more food and forage in 1910 than any other crop we 

 grew. It is by far the most important crop grown in this 

 State. The value of the crop on the farm ifor the 

 whole country was estimated by experts connected with 

 the United States Department of Agriculture at the 

 enormous sum of $1,523,968,000. Our wheat crop for 

 1910 was estimated as worth on the farm $621,443,000. 



