LIFE HISTORY OF TIMOTHY 9 
The size to which a timothy plant may grow after a few seasons 
depends very largely upon the space available for its development. 
In the fall of 1917 timothy plants, each of which at that time con- 
sisted of a few clons from a selected plant, were transplanted 3.3 by 
3.3 feet apart in rows where they were afterwards cultivated and 
hoed each season. On February 28, 1923, these plants were exam- 
ined. Kelatively few of the plants had died; a small proportion of 
them were about the same size as when transplanted; most of them 
had become much larger, many of them being from 10 to 15 inches 
in diameter at the surface of the soil, and some were still larger. In 
any timothy plant which has been growing in a cultivated row for 
one or two seasons, usually practically all of the space within its 
periphery. is occupied by a dense growth of living shoots. A con- 
spicuous feature of such plants, which had been growing in cultivated 
rows through five seasons, was that in a large proportion of them the 
centers were occupied only by dead roots and stubble, around which 
the growing shoots were located in formations suggesting "fairy 
rings." In some of these older plants the growing shoots formed a 
continuous ring, and in others it was broken at one or more places. 
In one of the larger plants examined, the largest diameter of which 
was 18 inches and the smallest 16 inches, there was an area 8 inches 
in diameter in the middle with only dead shoots, around which the 
living shoots were growing in a practically unbroken ring. 
Where plants are growing in ordinary meadows they do not be- 
come as large as in cultivated rows. Sometimes a plant 2 or 3 
years old growing in a dense stand may have but a single growing 
shoot. In the 2-year-old and 3-year-old meadows which were ex- 
amined October 3, 1914. it was found that where the stand of timothy 
was not very dense, while the shoots of some of them occupied an 
area 2 or 3 inches in diameter, most of the plants were smaller. 
Although in a meadow timothy plants spread outward to some 
extent as they become older, yet the areas occupied by adjacent 
plants ordinarily do not overlap as in fields of some other grasses 
which form dense turfs. Each plant in a timothy meadow usually 
remains more or less separated from adjoining plants. This con- 
dition is shown in Plate 4, A. 
ARRANGEMENT OF LEAVES AND SHOOTS 
Buds and secondary shoots, like the subtending leaves, are ar- 
ranged in two ranks, succeeding ones being on alternate sides of 
the primary shoot. This arrangement is illustrated by the plant 
shown in Plate 2, A. 
The leaves on the secondary shoots grow in a plane which is at 
right angles to that in which the leaves of the primary shoot are 
growing. This is also shown by the lower leaves with short blades 
in the shoots at the left side of the central one in Plate 2, A. 
If the plant is situated where there is ample space for development 
and if other conditions for growth are favorable, buds in the axils 
of the leaves of the secondary shoots may also develop into a third set 
of shoots. The leaves of this third set of shoots are normally in a 
plane at right angles to the plane in which the leaves of the second- 
ary shoot are growing. Under usual conditions, however, as the 
shoots and leaves grow and their position becomes determined accord- 
