THE FIGIIT WITH QUACK GRASS. 
How to Battle With the Pest. 
Part I. 
X THE ORCHARD.—I noticed on page 1009 an 
inquiry l>v W. M. J. of Buffalo, N. Y., as to how 
quack grass may be eradicated from a young 
orchard without injuring the trees. It surely is un¬ 
fortunate that this weed has a hold in the young 
orchard, for it is very troublesome, indeed, even when 
annual, biennial or perennial in order to know how 
to best combat it. There are so many ways of weed 
eradication, suited as they are to particular classes 
of weeds, that this knowledge is essential. For in¬ 
stance, it would be folly to pull out Canada thistles, 
thinking in this manner to eradicate them. Simi¬ 
larly, fields which are well seeded with wild mus¬ 
tard should not be cleaned up by Summer fallow¬ 
ing—it would be time and money thrown away to 
do this. The wild mustard is an annual plant, is 
According to the land upon which it is growing, 
quack grass grows from one to five feet in height. 
The leaves are from three to 12 inches long and 
usually abouS-^i fourth of an incn wide. There is 
one mark on tlK leaf which will usually distinguish 
quack grass from any other grasses. About an inch 
back from the tip of the leaf, there is a constriction 
running crosswise of the midrib. This cannot al¬ 
ways be plainly seen unless the leaf is held up to 
the sunlight, when the constriction appears darker 
HARVESTING A FIELD OF EUREKA SILAGE CORN GROWN ON LONG ISLAND. Fig. ISO. 
it is out in the open, and will be much harder to 
eradicate, being, as it must be by this time, in among 
the roots of the young trees. It seems that there 
must have been some patches of quack grass on the 
laud before the trees were planted and when the 
meadow was plowed up and the land fitted for the 
trees, some of the roots were dragged around, and 
now the whole young orchard is well seeded, in 
order to eradicate quack grass or any other noxious 
weed successfully it is necessary to know the na¬ 
ture and habits of the weed and the principles of 
plant, growth. We must know whether the weed is 
propagated by its seeds and not roots, and hence 
the simple pulling of the plants before the seed has 
ripened is sufficient to eradicate them. It is only 
necessary to keep any plants from maturing seed 
in order to finally eradicate wild mustard. But with 
quack grass, pulling or keeping the seed from ma¬ 
turing would be useless because this weed has other 
methods of propagating itself than by the seeds. 
NATURE OF QUACK GRASS.—in its different 
stages of growth, quack grass may be very easily 
confused with some other common grasses, namely, 
Canada blue grass. Red-top, or English rye grass. 
than the other parts of the leaf. This is regarded 
by botanists as a sure identification of quack grass, 
but I have seen leaves upon which it was pretty 
hard to find this constriction. Anorner distinguish¬ 
ing feature of the leaves is that they are rough to 
the touch above and smooth below. The parts of the 
leaf which clasp the stem (sheaths) are shorter than 
(he distances between the joints—that is, one can 
always see the joint above the leaf sheath below. 
The quack grass head is from three to eight inches 
long and usually one-fourth to one-half inch wide. 
It is a spike which is hard to distinguish from the 
