GRAMINEAE (GRASS FAMILY) 49 
ences of soil and climate, from Dakota flax fields to southern Cali: 
fornia wheat fields. The stiff and twisted awns are frequently 
injurious to animals that eat them, causing serious irritation in 
mouth, nostrils, and digestive tract; also, the hard skins and thick 
hulls of the seeds sometimes permit of their passing unharmed 
through the intestines to be sown with 
the droppings. (Fig. 21.) 
Wild Oats look much like the culti- 
vated grain, the culms growing in tufts, 
two to four feet tall, with long, smooth, 
green leaves about a half-inch wide, and 
loose, open seed-panicles six to ten 
inches long, the spikelets pendulous, the 
glumes nearly equal, slightly ridged; 
smooth and pointed. But the lemmas 
or hulls that enclose the seed are, in the 
cultivated plant, smooth and thin; those 
of the Wild Oat are larger, much 
thicker, covered with stiff, brown hairs, 
and have a ring of rigid, brown hairs at 
base; they bear a stiff awn about an 
inch long, which is both twisted and 
bent; the awns of the cultivated oat 
are much shorter and not so stiff. 
These crooked and bristly awns are able 
to cling to the wool of sheep and to 
the insides of grain-sacks, which helps 
the seeds to find new homes; when 
dampened they relax, and twist again Fic. 21.— Wild Oats (Avena 
when dry, so boring easily into the soil. fatua). X i. 
Wild Oats will germinate and the young 
plant force its way to air and sunlight, even when buried four 
or five inches deep in the ground. 
Means of control 
Sow clean seed. No matter what its cost, it cannot be so expen- 
sive as the fouling of a whole grain crop, sometimes to such a degree 
E 
