GRAMINEAE (GRASS FAMILY) 63 
Means of control 
There is no easy way to subdue Quack-grass; but it can be done, 
and in a single season, without loss of the use of the ground. It 
must be remembered that the storehouse of the plant is its creeping 
rootstock, the material for the growth of which comes from the food 
assimilated by the green leaves, therefore no green leaves must be 
allowed to develop. Professor Beal, the noted botanist of the 
Michigan Experiment Station, outlines the following plan, based on 
long practical use: “If convenient, pasture closely for a whole 
growing season, which prevents the production of new, thrifty 
rootstocks, then, if the sod be well turned under deep, rolled and 
harrowed, much of the grass will be killed at once. Ordinarily I 
plow late in the fall or very early in the spring, rain or shine, wet or 
dry, or even in June, and cultivate with a shovel-toothed cultivator 
every three days till the middle of June or later, if starting the work 
later. Rarely, if the weather be wet and hot, cultivate every two 
and a half days. Keep all green leaves from showing themselves. 
Do not delay to see green leaves. A harrow that does not cut 
off the stems below the surface of the ground is not efficient.” A 
late crop of corn can be grown on this land and the last spears of 
the grass killed in its cultivation. 
When the grass takes possession of cultivated ground its root- 
stocks are usually much deeper in the soil than in pastures and 
meadows. An early fall plowing, with the furrow turned just deep 
enough to cut the matted rootstocks free from the subsoil (usually 
about six inches), followed by toothed harrowing to work the soil 
free from the rootstocks so that they may be raked into piles to be 
dried and burned or thoroughly rotted in a compost heap, is another 
good way to fight Quack-grass. Two bouts of such fall plowing 
and harrowing, raking, and burning, the second a little deeper and 
crosswise of the first, with early and careful cultivation in the spring, 
followed by a hoed crop thoroughly tilled until midsummer, will 
clean out the weed; and the enlarged yield of the crop due to the 
needful extra cultivation will recompense the increase of care and 
labor. 
Small areas of the pest may be smothered to death by being covered 
with boards, or spreading thick with manure or straw (not less 
than a foot deep and well packed down so as to exclude air), or with 
