35 



starts very early, grows rapidly, furnishing good early pasture, and 

 ripens seed before the hottest weather. It is of little value as hay, and 

 is not worth introducing where the ordinary forage plants can be grown. 

 The seed is seldom sown, but the plant comes spontaneously each year 

 from self-sown seed. A few have begun its artificial propagation, and 

 it is undoubtedly worthy of introduction into other regions in the South 

 and West having prolonged droughts. It is hardy at the North, but 

 makes a much smaller growth there. 

 Brewer and Watson, in The Botany of California, say in regard to it : 



Very common throughout the State, extending to British Columbia, New Mexico, 

 and Mexico; also widely distributed in South America and the Eastern Continent. 

 It has generally been considered an introduced species, but it is more decidedly and 

 widely at home throughout the interior than any other introduced plant, and accord- 

 ing to much testimony it was as common throughout California early in the present 

 century as now. It is popularly known as Alfilaria, or less commonly as Pin-clover 

 and Pin-grass, and is a valuable and nutritious forage plant, reputed to impart an ex- 

 cellent flavor to milk and butter. 



Prof. E. W. Hilgard, in an article on the Agriculture and Soils of Cali- 

 fornia, in the Beport of the Department of Agriculture for 1878, page 

 488, says : 



Two species of Cranes'-bill (Erodium cicutarium and moschatum) are even more com- 

 mon here than in Southern Europe, and the first named is esteemed as one of the most 

 important natural pasture plants, being about the' only green thing available to stock 

 throughout the dry season, and eagerly cropped by them at all times. Its Spanish 

 name of Alfilerilla (signifying apin, and now frequently translated into " pin-weed " ) 

 shows that it is an old ci izen, even if possibly a naturalized one. 



Otanes F. Wright, Temescal, San Bernardino County, California : 



Alfilaria grows plentifully and is native here. It is the best grass that we have 

 during the wet season while green, but does not amount to much when dry, for 

 it shrinks much in drying, and when dry breaks easily into very fine bits, almost to 

 dust. 



Alfilaria and Bur-clover nearly always grow together on the same land ; cold 

 weather never kills either of them. Stock pick for the Alfilaria while growing (from 

 January to June) ; but after it dies they hunt for the clover burs which are on the 

 ground, and in their efforts to get the burs they roll the old dry stems into rolls some- 

 times as big as winrows of hay. 



Bur-clover and Filaria (Alfilaria) grow on high land, and die when dry weather 

 comes. I do not know but they might be kept green all the year if kept wet. 



They are about the only plants which grow on the high land that stock will eat. 

 Our need is a grass that will grow on the high land all the year as Alfalfa does on 

 the low lands. As nine-tenths of our land is dry land, you can see the extent of our 

 needs. 



Daniel Griswold, Westminster, Los Angeles County, California : 



I think Alfilaria would be a good thing to raise in the Southern States, but it will 

 be a rather hard seed to gather, though not so hard as Bermuda grass. It produces a 

 small-jointed seed, with a beard or curl attached. Butte or Colusa County would bo 

 the best place to obtain the seed. The plant is native here. It is never cultivated, 

 but comes up of itself whenever there is raiu enough. It grows everywhere (except 

 in swamps), in damp land, on the driest land, and on the tops of hills up to the snow- 

 line. 



