8 FARM GRASSES OP THE UNITED STATES 



crop. This is largely due to the prevailing habit of 

 leaving timothy meadows down after they have become 

 unprodudtive. 



It is a remarkable fadl that nearly all the grass lit- 

 erature issued by the American experiment stations 

 comes from those stations outside of the timothy re- 

 gion. Inside this region the early introduction of 

 timothy, red clover, and Kentucky blue-grass solved 

 the grass problem in a manner satisfactory to the farmer 

 before the establishment of the experiment stations, 

 and these institutions have, therefore, devoted their 

 energies to more pressing problems. The most im- 

 portant grass literature from these States is to be found 

 in the reports from early agricultural societies. These 

 reports indicate that grass problems were at one time 

 as important in the region in question as they now are 

 outside of it. Nearl)^ all the correspondence that 

 comes to the oflBce of Grass and Forage Plant Investi- 

 gations of the United States Department of Agriculture 

 originates either in the cotton-growing States, where 

 grass culture has been negledted, or in the arid and 

 semi-arid West,»where satisfactory grasses are yet to 

 be found. 



Clover ranks next to ' ' other tame grasses ' ' in the 

 area devoted to it. The figures apply, of course, to 

 the clovers when sown without timothy or other true 

 grasses. The area devoted to clover is 4,104,000 

 acres, or 7 per cent, of the total area of tame hay 

 The average yield of this class of crops is given at 1.3 

 tons per acre. The clovers, particularly the common 

 red clover (^Trifolium pratense), are much more im- 

 portant in American agriculture than these figures 



