353 
ANNUAL  REPORT  FOR  1909  OF  THE 
CONSULTING  BOTANIST. 
The  number  of  inquiries  since  the  last  Report,  that  is,  from 
December  1,  1908,  to  December  31,  1909,  amounts  to  370. 
The  majority  of  these  inquiries  dealt  with  seeds  for  pastures. 
One  hundred  and  fifteen  samples  of  different  species  of  grasses 
were  examined  and  tested,  and  fourteen  samples  of  clovers 
also.  The  quality  of  these  seeds  was  very  satisfactory.  More 
attention  is  being  paid  to  the  kind  of  plants  which  should 
be  used  in  laying  down  or  improving  land  for  golf-courses, 
tennis-courts,  and  pastures.  Thirty-nine  prescriptions  have 
been  supplied  for  such  purposes. 
Weeds. 
Members  were  informed  as  to  the  names  and  properties  of 
various  weeds,  and  directions  were  given  how  to  treat  them. 
Two  cases  of  the  appearance  of  smooth  brome  grass  (Bromus 
racemosus  Linn.)  in  winter  oats  have  been  reported  on.  The 
strange  notion  that  this  grass  is  a reverting  of  the  cultivated 
oats  to  its  original  form  is  still  entertained  by  not  a few  farmers. 
A case  had  previously  come  before  me  in  which  the  farmer 
was  informed  by  the  seed  merchant  that  the  pure  oat  seed 
was  going  back  to  this  its  primitive  form.  In  one  of  the  cases 
submitted  to  me  this  year,  the  sender  assured  me  that  the 
seeds  attached  to  the  roots  of  two  plants  of  brome  grass  sent 
were  those  of  the  oat,  and  that  a neighbour  had  obtained  a 
specimen  in  which  a brome  grass  and  an  oat  grew  from  the 
same  seed.  It  is  hard  to  get  rid  of  a wide-spread  popular 
error  like  this,  but  the  member,  when  the  differences  of  the 
two  plants  were  pointed  out  to  him,  and  he  learned  that  these 
differences  were  as  great  in  the  vegetable  kingdom  (though 
not  so  obvious)  as  those  between  the  cow  and  the  sheep  in  the 
animal  kingdom,  was  satisfied  that  the  popular  notion  was 
an  error. 
Argentine  Certificates. 
Fifteen  certificates  in  regard  to  the  purity  of  seeds  intended 
to  be  exported  to  the  Argentine  Republic  were  issued. 
Plant  Diseases. 
The  diseases  investigated  presented  no  novelty  ; all  had 
been  described,  and  most  of  them  figured  in  former  Reports. 
Several  cases  of  “ clover  sickness  ” caused  by  Sclerotinia  Tri- 
foliorum  occurred  (Journal,  1898,  page  753,  and  1903,  page 
VOL.  70.  A A 
