120 



Germination of Indigenous Seeds. 



[May, 



given by the indigenous legumes is therefore seen to be chiefly 

 due to excess of hard seed and not so much to poor viability. 



The evidence suggests that on the average the grain weight 

 (wt. in gr. per 1,000 seeds) of the indigenous seed tends to be 

 less than that of their commercial counterparts. It has to be 

 remembered, however, that the collected seed had not been 

 cleaned or dressed and that the grain weight has been the 

 " natural " weight. It is, however, a well-known fact that 

 even commercial samples of wild white clover have decidedly 

 lower grain weights than samples of commercial white or 

 Dutch Clover. Comparison between samples of wild red> 

 clover and of ordinary English grown red clover show more- 

 over that the wild red seldom contains many seeds as large 

 as the larger of those met with in the cultivated clovers. 



The collection of indigenous legumes is a very slow and 

 tedious process. This is particularly so in the case of the wild 

 vetches, which do not as a rule grow in large masses and the 

 individual plants of which appear to be rather poor seed 

 bearers, ripening their seed moreover irregularly over a some- 

 what long period. 



The collection of wild white clover by hand is certainly 

 not lightly to be undertaken, and the heads collected often 

 yield most disappointing crops of seed.* The hand collection 

 of wild red clover is even more tedious than of wild white — 

 for it is not so frequently met with in large masses. Both are 

 species that in the writer's opinion could only be remuneratively 

 harvested from old swards on which they are abundant, and 

 then only by resort to the reaper or to the scythe or possibly 

 the daisy rake.t 



Grasses. — Particulars with reference to the grasses are given 

 in Table II. All the germination figures have been arrived at 

 on the basis of including " light " seed with the pure seed for 

 the germination test.} In order to make the comparisons more 

 thorough the percentage of " heavy " seed is given in the case 

 of those species in samples of which ' ' light ' ' seed is frequently 



° Mr. H. H. Dunn, of Dunn's Farm Seeds Ltd., informs me that 4 bush, 

 of heads have in one case yielded no more than ^ lb. seed — while it is said 

 that under favourable circumstances 20 lb. of heads will yield 1 lb. of seed. 



f The writer is not enamoured of the daisy rake as a very helpful imple- 

 ment, although he is prepared to admit he may be prejudiced against it by 

 his own lack of skill in its use, but even in the hands of r practical gardener 

 the results did not appear particularly encouraging. 



X That is to say, the plan of testing that was adopted at the Food Production 

 Department, and is still adopted at the Seed Testing Station of the Department 

 of Agriculture and Technical Instruction for Ireland, has been followed. 



