METHODS OF REESTABLISHING BUFFALO GRASS 7 



feet. The accumulation of moisture below this depth encourages the 

 development of taller grasses. 



OUTLINE OF EXPERIMENTS 



The experiments conducted at Hays, Kans., for 5 years have in- 

 cluded annual transplantings of buffalo-grass sods of various sizes 

 spaced at different distances and broadcastings of small pieces of turf 

 by hand and with a manure spreader. Some resodded areas were 

 clipped and others left undipped, to determine the effect of such 

 treatments and of shade upon the spread of the grass. After setting 

 out sods in a uniform manner on certain areas, parts of such areas 

 were seeded with sweetclover and the crop allowed to maintain itself 

 by continuous reseeding, to ascertain the effect of the clover upon the 

 spread of the grass and the possibility of obtaining sweetclover pasture 

 while the grass was becoming established. 



The effect of light irrigations was determined by applying water to 

 certain station lawns after transplanting with sods. The effect of 

 periodic excesses of moisture was studied by setting out sods in the 

 spillway ends of roadway drainage systems. This also provided an 

 opportunity to study the function of buffalo grass in controlling ero- 

 sion. Studies of a similar nature were conducted on terraced and 

 unterraced eroded land. 



The recently invented Davis erosion-control hole-digging machine 

 was tried in preparing land for transplanting sods on certain areas. 

 Other mechanical contrivances have been given some consideration 

 in an effort to expedite and reduce the expense of resodding operations. 

 Sods have been set out at different times during the year, to determine 

 the optimum transplanting period. Measurements of the actual 

 spread of the grass under different controlled conditions were made 

 whenever possible. 



ARTIFICIAL SEEDING 



Buffalo grass cannot be reestablished with consistent success by 

 artificial seedings. The seeds usually germinate poorly and are 

 extremely difficult to collect because produced so near the ground. 



Occasionally the seeds germinate satisfactorily under natural 

 conditions. In moving a building during the winter of 1930-31 the 

 excavated soil from the new building site was used to fill in and level 

 the ground. It was planned to resod this area, but a volunteer stand 

 of scattering buffalo-grass plants emerged and made artificial trans- 

 planting unnecessary. Inspection of these plants showed that they 

 emerged from seed at a uniform depth of 1 inch. Parts of the seed 

 were still adhering to the rootlets when examined. Apparently all the 

 viable seed covered to a proper depth produced plants. 



This original stand was rather thin at first, but it spread rapidly, 

 and by the end of the 1933 season had covered practically all inter- 

 vening spaces. After transplanting only a few sods in the blank 

 spaces this lawn, composed of pure buffalo grass, presented a pleasing 

 uniform appearance at the end of the third season (fig. 5). 



The success of this volunteer seeding indicates the importance of 

 continuing investigations in the development of strains bearing viable 

 seed, also of satisfactory seeding and seed-harvesting methods. 



