202 



BARLEY 



BARLEY 



BARLEY. Hordeum sativum, Jessen, Graminece. 

 Figs. 287-94. 



By R. A. Moore. 



An annual cereal grain, supposed to be native of 

 western Asia, and cultivated from the earliest 

 times. It is grown for the grain and herbage, the 

 grain being used as food for live-stock, but 

 chiefly in the making of malt for beer. 

 Flowers perfect, the stamens 3, styles 2, 

 arranged in spikelets that are borne 2 to 6 

 on notches or nodes of the rachis and form- 

 ing a long head or spike; flowering glumes 

 5-nerved, one of them usually long-awned, 

 usually persisting about the grain as a hull; 

 empty glumes very narrow and surrounding 

 the spikelet. 



Barley was very widely grown before 

 the Christian era and was used largely as 

 food for human consumption. Its use as a 

 bread plant was universal throughout the 

 civilized countries of Europe, Asia and 

 Africa, down to the close of the fifteenth 

 century. It gradually gave way to the bet- 

 ter grains for bread-making, and is now, 

 and will henceforth probably be used mostly 

 as an animal food and for brewing 

 purposes. The inhabitants of the 

 European and Asiatic countries 

 used barley rather generally as a 

 food for horses, and the practice 

 is common at present in several 

 of those regions. 



According to the Twelfth Cen- 

 sus there were in the United States 

 272,913 farms reported as pro- 

 ducing barley in 1899. They de- 

 voted to the crop 4,470,196 acres, 

 and secured a production of 119,- 

 634,877 bushels, valued at $41,631,762, The four 

 states giving the highest production are, in order, 

 California, Minnesota, North Dakota and Wiscon- 

 sin. According to the Fourth Census of Canada 

 (1901), there were in the Dominion, 871,800 acres 

 in barley, which produced 22,224,366 bushels. 



Varieties. 



For all practical purposes, barley may be classi- 

 fied as six-rowed, four-rowed, and two-rowed. 

 There are also beardless, bearded and hulless varie- 

 ties of the above groups. The four-rowed barley 

 does not seem to be a distinct variety, but a vari- 

 ation of the six-rowed, as often the six-rowed bar- 

 ley drops two rows midway up the spike, the upper 

 part being nearly four-rowed. 



Linnffius and the earlier botanists recognized 

 six species : 



Fig. 287. 

 Flower of barley, 



Six-rowed barleys . 

 Two-rowed barleys 

 Naked barleys . . 



J a. Hordeum hexastichum 

 ( b. Hordeum vulgare 

 ( c. Hordeum distichum 

 ( d. Hordeum Zeocriton 



Hordeum coeleste 

 Hordeum nudum 



vum, which is taken in the sense of a group-species. 

 All the cultivated barleys are supposed to be de- 

 rived from the wild West Asian Hordeum spon- 

 taneum, C. Koch. 



The term "variety" is used by seedsmen, plant- 

 breeders and farmers in a wider and not so rigid 

 sense as that applied by the botanist. Races of 

 barley, the type of which has been materially 

 changed by careful selection or cross-breeding for 

 a period of years, are in common practice desig- 

 nated as " varieties." 



The Manshury or Manchuria, Oderbrucker, Golden 

 Queen, Hanna, Silver King, and the like, are terms 

 that have been given to various strains of barley, 

 and each is often used as applying to a distinct 

 variety. In common practice the name of the 

 country from which a grain is received is often 

 applied to the variety and may become known over 

 a great extent of territory. The Manshury barley 

 is known throughout the United States and Canada, 

 and is more generally grown in parts of the middle 

 West than any other type. 



Culture. 



Adaptability. — Barley is grown under a wider 

 range of soil and climatic conditions than any 

 other cereal, and readily adjusts itself to the 

 natural environments under which it is placed. 

 In Europe, barley is grown from the Mediterra- 

 nean sea to Lapland, 70° north latitude, and in 



Botanists now generally group all these as sub- 

 types under the botanical name of Hordeum sati- 



Flg. 288. Heads of Mansliury 

 (or Manchuria) barley, for. 

 comparison with Oderbrucker. 



Fig. 289. Characteristic heads 

 of Oderbrucker barley, witii 

 lower beards clipped to 

 show arrangement of ker- 

 nels from side and edge. 



