Vol. XXXIX No. 25. 
Whole No. 1586. 
NEW YORK, JUNE 19, 1880. 
{ Price Five Cents. 
/ $2.00 Per Year, 
[Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1880, by the Rural New-Yorker, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 
Jifiit top. 
THE ELDORADO WHEAT. 
Last winter a subscriber to the Roral, 
Mr. H. N. Likely, of Fremont Co., Colorado, 
sent us a head of wheat for name, which ou 
account of its peculiar shape, and the reports 
of the marvelous productiveness of the va¬ 
riety, we have here reproduced for the benefit 
of Rural readers. The sender describes it as 
a spring variety which in that locality is 
known as Seven-headed wheat, and states 
that it requires no extra cultivation to raise 
from fifty to seventy-five bushels per acre, and 
he has never known it to be troubled with in¬ 
sects, rust or smut. The story there goes that 
a farmer in that neighborhood found a single 
plant growing on his land some few years ago, 
from which he saved the seed and from the 
product supplied his neighbors. 
Professor A. E. Blount, of the State Agricul¬ 
tural College of Colorado, writes us concern¬ 
ing it as follows :— 
The name is Eldorado—some call it “Seven¬ 
headed wheat" and Egyptian wheat.” The 
Egyptian has seven beads and is the same as 
Seven-headed. The Eldorado has as many as 
15 heads from and ou oue rachis, and the pe¬ 
duncle is much stiffer and stronger. The larg¬ 
est yield 1 know of is 90 bushel per acre in this 
valley. Last year I sowed ou a plot, 14^ feet, 
wide by 275 long, 14 ozs. of very inferior, 
cracked grain. Only about a third of it came 
up. I cut it on July 24 with a sickle and 
thrashed out 127£ pounds, or 2.1-S bushels—at 
the rate of a little over 90 bushels per acre. 
I am nor able to speak concerning the flour it 
would make. The graiu is very white, but the 
white is not uniform. The gluten and starch 
"set” somehow in the dough state of its ripen¬ 
ing, which leaves the face of the grain white 
while other parts of it are transparent. The 
Egyptian wheat has the finer and more hand¬ 
some grain; but it is not nearly as prolific as 
the Eldorado. 
SORGHUM HALEPENSE—AGAIN. 
M. B. BATEHAM. 
From what the writer of this note has seen 
of the much-praised Sorghum halepense in the 
South, we caution our readers against intro¬ 
ducing it upon their farms in any part of the 
country where the roots are hardy enough to 
endure the climate. 
The above appeared among the editorial 
Brevities in the Rural of May S. I wish the 
editor had stated what new objections, if any, 
he had discovered in the South. [The chief 
objections made ugaiu&t this fodder plant are 
mentioned in Rural for May 29.— Eds.] The 
difficulty of eradicating it from the soil where 
it once has possession, would have no serious 
weight with our Southwestern farmers where 
land is cheap, aud they would prefer to have 
uo trouble in re-plautiug. The next objection 
is the coarseue6s of the stems and their woody 
nature il not cut early aud often during the 
season, but this should, of course, be avoided 
by frequent and timely hoeing. I have no 
60 rt of inturest in the dissemination of this 
grass, bul baviug recommended it to the stock 
farmers of the Southwest, especially dairy far¬ 
mers, as a possible tneuus of Jesseuiug the dis¬ 
astrous effects of the summer droughts, I 
should like to know if there are good reasons 
for recalling that advice. 
1 have received letters the past year from 
several farmers of the South, who have used 
this grass for quite a number of years, aud 
give it the very highest commendations; aud 
as far as my reading has gone, the weight of 
testimony is decidedly in its favor. Oue year 
ago I sent a small handful of the roots to the 
noted dairy farmer aud cheese and butter 
manufacturer, W. B. Straight of Hudson, Ohio, 
for him to test, with myself, the anility of the 
plant to endure the winters of Ohio. He was 
so well pleased with its appearance during the 
drought of last summer and its perfect resist¬ 
ance of the winter—though this was too mild 
to afford a proper test—that he has determined 
to plant several acres of it the coming season. 
It may be remarked here that Mr. Straight is 
the roost active partner of the firm of 8. Straight 
and Son who are the owners of a dozen or 
more cheese factories and creamery establish¬ 
ments in Summit Co., Ohio, the products of 
which are all brought daily for curing, pack¬ 
ing, etc., to their great central depot at Hud¬ 
son. Mr. S. is also the owner and manager of 
a farm of 150 acres with a dairy of twenty 
choice cows on which he has for several years 
been experimenting with the soiling system of 
feeding, in the hope that he may be able to 
teaeh the dairy farmers of the county better 
systems of feeding than they have hitherto 
practiced; so that it will be inferred that his 
name carries much weight among the more 
intelligent class of such farmers. The follow¬ 
ing is an extract from a recent letter to me on 
the subject of grasses for withstanding drought. 
"I left the roots of that Green Valley or 
Johnson grass you sent me last spring (which 
I put in my garden) in the ground all winter 
without any protection, and I see thatitisgrow- 
addition to feed for this section iu years of 
drought, if the farmers would be willing to 
perform the labor and have the patience to 
wait for it. We must, if possible, secure aud 
cultivate forage plants and grasses that will 
withstand dry weather such as we are now 
having. Even clover is now (May 19) com¬ 
mencing to head, and orchard grass, except in 
very rich ground, is not doing well. We need 
forage plants aud grasses that root deep, send¬ 
ing their roots down after moisture instead of 
those, like timothy and such grasses, whose 
roots lie near the surface to perish in time of 
d ronght. 
I am of the opinion that as our forests are 
cleared off, the evaporation will he greater, 
and it will be more necessary to provide deep¬ 
rooting plants instead of shallow-rooting 
ones. 
FORAGE GRASSES. 
PROFESSOR W. J. BEAL. 
We often hear of the nutritious native 
grasses which abouud on the Western prairies 
of the United States. In many places the cli¬ 
mate is very dry. The grasses grow during 
the coolest or the wettest portions of the year, 
and remain partially cured just where they 
staad, retaining their nutritive qualities. 
ELDORADO WHEAT.— From Life,—Fig. 207. 
mg again from the roots and has spread con¬ 
siderably. Last winter was mild aud the 
roots might not survive such treatment through 
a cold winter. I should, however, if ralsiug 
it, mulch the ground with coarse straw ma¬ 
nure in the fall, aud perhaps ridge the laud 
with the plow, which would not only protect 
from frost but contribute richness. I am under 
the impression that it will prove to be a great 
There is no rain to wash out the virtue of the 
leaves and stems. 
Indian-Grass —Andropogon furoatus. — In 
many portious of the dry prairies, the prevail¬ 
ing grass is Andropogon furcatus. Of this 
there are several local names oue of which is 
broom-grass, but there is no one good common 
name by which the grass is known. It is com¬ 
mon in dry, sterile soils In the Northern and 
Southern States, especially in open places, along 
banks, on the dry bordei s of marshes and in 
oak-openiDgs. It grows from four to six or 
more feet in bight. There are usually three to 
five spikes together, which are well represented 
in the illustration. The flowers appear late in 
the season—in September in the Northern. 
States. The stems are stout, hard, and woody; 
the leaves tough. It is well adapted to a dry 
climate. It is one of the principal native 
grasses for hay in Kansas. Nebraska, and the 
neighboring States. According to one author, 
who has studied the subject, 28 per cent, of 
the bulk of the prairie grasses are composed 
of this species. 
Broom Grass, Broom Sedge.— Andropogon 
scoparius—is another grass of the same species 
common in the same places as the last. The 
stems are finer and branching; the leaves are 
finer. The grass grows from one to three feet 
high. Both of these Andropogons grow in 
bunches or tufts. The leaves and stems of both 
are often purplish. The latter is the finer of the 
two as a pasture grass, but produces less feed. 
About 15 per cent, of the bulk of prairie grass, 
according to the report above mentioned, are 
composed of this species. While young and 
j ust starting the tufts make good feed, but after 
the stems appear it is much less palatable to 
cattle and all kinds of stock. The Agricultu¬ 
ral Report for 1878 quotes Mr. C. Mohr, of 
Mobile, as saying this is “ one of oar most 
common grasses, covering old fields and fence 
rows, and extensively growing in the dry, 
sandy soil of the pine woods. Much despised 
as this grass is as a troublesome, unsightly 
weed, it has its good qualities which entitle it 
to a more charitable consideration. In the 
dry pine woods it contributes, while green and 
tender, a large share to the sustenance of the 
stock.” There are several other species less 
abundant than these, but much like them in 
quality or mode of growth. They are useful 
to pioneers, bat their place should soou be 
supplied by grasses or other forage plants of 
better quality. No doubt these could be im¬ 
proved in time by judicious selection of seeds 
and careful cultivation for some generations. 
fomiilfigiral. 
THE YELLOWS IN PEACH TREES. 
JAMES HOGG. 
Lately, m looking over some old farm and 
garden magazines, I found the disease known 
as the "Yellows” which is so injurious to 
peach trees, discussed by many writers, all of 
whom failed to determine what it is, or how it 
originated, and our most expert pomclogists 
of a later day are equally puzzled as to its 
origin, and baffled in their efforts to dud a cure 
for it. So far as I am aware, none of our 
botanists who have made a specialty of vege¬ 
table physiology aud pathology, have turned 
their attention to it. This is unfortunate, for 
if they were to devote themselves to the eluci¬ 
dation of these subjects, the results of their 
labors would be of great value to cultivators, of 
nearly, if not of quite, as much importance as 
the study of the kiudred scieuees in animal life, 
has in the hands of the veterinary surgeon 
been to the breeder and grazier. When read¬ 
ing the description of the sympioms of the 
disease, the accounts of its virulence and the 
proofs of its contagiousness, I was struck with 
the aualogy it bore to some diseases incident 
to animal life. I propose to give some sugges¬ 
tions ou the subject, hoping that the attention 
of some of our botanists, especially of those 
who have had a medical education, may be 
drawn to the subject. 
The first appearance of this disease among 
peach trees was in 1797 in the neighborhood of 
Philadelphia, whence it spread rapidly through 
Delaware, New Jersey, Maryland, New York 
