30 MISC. PUBLICATION 101, U. S. DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE 
Bidwell and Wooton (9), analyzing specimens collected in © 
midwinter, find a remarkably high average protein (16.4 per cent) © 
and nitrogen-free extract (41.2 per cent) content after numerous 
alternate freezings and thawings. 
The Forest Service has thus far received no complaints of injury 
to livestock under range conditions from eating fourwing saltbush. 
There is, however, evidence that too concentrated feeding on this 
shrub might cause scours in range cattle (42), and that it does occa- 
sionally poison sheep (42), and Miller of the Nevada Agricultural 
Experiment Station reports (33) that he has separated out a saponin- 
like substance from this species which causes a sort of anemia 
(haemolytic properties), the action however being largely seasonal. 
It would be of interest to know whether the symptoms of sheep 
poisoned by an overdose of fourwing saltbush herbage are analogous 
to those resulting from an overdose of common salt (sodium chlo- 
ride). The high degree of alkalinity in the herbage of the saltbushes 
suggests the desirability of an admixture of grasses or other feed 
in utilizing these species. 
The New Mexico Agricultural Experiment Station has been mak- 
ing intensive studies of fourwing saltbush, and Wilson (142, p. 28) 
has found that, under range conditions existent in southern New 
Mexico at least, “the presence of calcium carbonate in pulverized 
form at or near the surface of the soil appears to be very beneficial, 
if not quite necessary ” for the growth of young seedlings of this 
species. 
Australian saltbush (A. semibaccata) is one of the forage salt- 
bushes which have been experimentally cultivated in the West. Suc- 
cess in cultivating Australian saltbushes has, on the whole, been 
rather indifferent. The Australian species do not, at least as a rule, 
withstand the low temperatures that most of our native montane 
species must endure. A. semibaccata has, however, thriven in warm 
and dry districts of California where, according to E. Nelson (94), 
all classes of stock not only eat it readily, either green or cured, but 
are said to thrive on it. It is cut for hay, as well as used for pas- 
turage, and may be mowed as many as three times in aseason. Yields 
of 20 tons of green feed or 5 tons of hay per acre are not at all 
unusual. 
Shadscale (A. confertifolia), or spiny saltbush (frequently known 
locally with other species of Atriplex as salt sage, is one of the 
most important native species of this genus. It ranges from south- 
ern Idaho to Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, northern Mexico, eastern 
California, and southeastern Oregon. Male and female flowers are 
borne on separate bushes, which average 114 to 3 feet in height but 
are occasionally as much as 5 feet tall, growing typically in dense 
clumps about 4 to 8 feet in diameter; the branches are spiny tipped. 
The species is common in alkaline valleys, but is sometimes found 
in gumbo soils, around the borders of dried-up alkaline lakes, and 
on dry plains and hills up to about 6,000 feet. Shadscale is a very 
valuable constituent of the winter and desert ranges which it occu- 
pies. Jared G. Smith (724) has the following interesting note on the 
species: 
The leaves and fruits drop off in autumn and are collected in the depressions 
of the surface or form little wind drifts behind the bushes, These piles of 
