80 THE AGRICULTURAL GRASSES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



nerved, and purplish. The flowers are somewhat crowded on the axis. 

 The flowering glumes are broad, obscurely nine-nerved, smooth on the 

 back, the margins below fringed with long, silky hairs, the narrow, 

 stiff, awned-teeth about half as long as the glumes (four or five lines). 

 This is a somewhat ornamental grass, but probably not of much agri- 

 cultural value. (Plate 74.) 



Cynodon dactylon. (Bermuda grass.) 



A low, creeping perennial grass, with abundant short leaves at the 

 base, sending up slender, nearly leafless flower stalks or culms, which 

 have three to five slender, diverging spikes at the summit. The spike- 

 lets are sessile in two rows on one side of the slender spikes; they each 

 have one flower with a short x)ediceled, naked rudiment of a second 

 flower; the outer glumes nearly equal, keeled ; the flowering glume boat- 

 shaped, broader and i^rominently keeled ; the palet narrow and two- 

 keeled. This grass is a native of Southern Europe and of all tropical 

 countries. It is a common pasture grass in the West Indies. In the 

 Southern States it has long been a chief reliance for pasture, has been 

 extravagantly praised by some and cursed by others who find it diffi- 

 cult to eradicate when once established. Its properties have been very 

 fully discussed in Southern journals. It rarely ripens any seed, and the 

 usual methods of reproducing is to chop up the roots with a cutting 

 knife, sow them broadcast, and plow under shallow. 



Ool. T. G. Howard, of Georgia, says : 



The desideratum to the South is a grass that is perennial, nutritious, and adapted 

 to the climate. While we have grasses and forage plants that do well when nursed, 

 we have few that live and thrive here as in their native habitafc. The Bermuda and 

 crab grasses are at home in the South. They not only live, but live in spite of neg- 

 lect, and when p totted and encouraged they make such grateful returns as astonish 

 the benefactor. 



Professor Killebrew, of Tennessee, says : 



In Louisiana, Texas, and the South generally it is and has been the chief reliance 

 for pasture for a long time, and the immense herds of cattle on the southern prairies 

 subsist principally on this food. It revels in sandy soils, and has been grown ex- 

 tensively on the sandy hills of Virginia and North and South Carolma. It is used 

 extensively on the southern rivers tq hold the levees and embankments of the roads. 

 It will throw its runners over a rock 6 feet across and soon hide it from view, or it 

 will run down the sides of the deepest gully and stop its washing. Hogs thrive upon 

 its succulent roots, and horses and cattle upon its foliage. It has the capacity to 

 withstand any amount of heat and drought, and months that are so dry as to check 

 the growth of blue grass will only make the Burmuda green and the more thrifty. 



Professor Phares, of Mississippi, says : 



As a permanent pasture grass, I know of no other that I consider so valuable as this, 

 after having transferred it from near the mouth of the Red River to my present re- 

 sidence thirty-five years ago, and having studied it on hundreds of other farms, com- 

 mons, and levees for a longer period. To make good hay and the largest yield, this 



