FIELD AND GARDEN CROPS 



OF THE 



NOETH-WEST PEOVINCES AND OUDH. 



I. 



TRITICUM SATIVUM, Lam: 



[ Vide Plates Ia. and Ib.] 



English, wheat; Veknacular, gehun, gohun, gandum (Persian). 



Natural order Graminece, tribe Jlordeece. An annual herbaceous grass. Stems many, 2-3 ft. 

 high, erect cylindrical, jointed, hollow except at the swollen pubescent joints, smooth, striate, glau- 

 cous. Leaves few, distant ; sheaths long, not inflated, smooth above, usually hairy on the lower 

 surface ; ligule short, truncate, torn ; blade 6 in. to 1 ft. or more in length, linear, gradually 

 tapering to a point, smooth or with a few scattered hairs, ciliate at the base, glaucous green. Spike- 

 lets 3-5-flowered, (the terminal flower always barren,) sessile, compressed, distichously arranged on 

 the two sides of a flattened excavated hairy rachis, the whole forming an oblong linear cylindrical or 

 sub-quadrangular spike 3-5 in. long, and with a few abortive spikelets at the base. Glumes 

 2, equal, boat-shaped, oblong-oval, hard, smooth and polished, midrib extended into a sharp point 

 with forward prickles. Pales 2, about equal in length, the lower boat-shaped, obtuse mucronate 

 or awned, the upper thin, papery, transparent, with two lateral nerves, edges inflexed, ciliate. 

 Lodicules 2, hairy at the top. Stamens 3 ; filaments slender ; anthers large protuded at the time 

 of flowering. Ovary obovate, truncate, hairy at the top ; stigmas 2, nearly sessile, feathery. 

 Fruit (the grain) enclosed within but not adhering to the pales, about ^ in. in length, ovoid or 

 roundish, flattened on the ventral side and with a deep longitudinal groove, white yellow or reddish. 

 Embryo minute, on one side at the base of hard floury albumen. 



The countless varieties and sub-varieties of wheat which are grown in these Pro- 

 vinces speak volumes for the importance of the part which it plays in the agriculture 

 of the country. It is only with rice that we find anything like the differentiation 

 which years of natural and artificial selection have produced in wheat. It would be 

 futile to attempt to classify these varieties by the vernacular names which they bear, 

 since these names are in most cases of very local application, and even when used over 

 an extensive tract of country are often found to be applied to totally different varieties 

 in diSerent parts of it. All that is possible here will be to indicate the lines on which 

 the varieties may be most rationally classified, noting the " vernacular names of a few 

 of the most prominent ones. 



The most convenient primary sub-division of wheats is into starchy and glutinous 

 or soft and hard, the former containing a larger proportion than the average of starch, 



• References :— Lam. Bnoycl. Meth. ii. 654. Bentley andTrimen Medicinal Plants 294. T. vulgare, Vill ; Powell 

 Funj. Prod. 225 ; Drury Useful PI. 434. T. attivum, Roxb. Fl. Ind. i. 369. T. hibernum, Koxb. 1. c. 



B 



