ON THE MIXED HERBAGE OF PERMANENT MEADOW. 
1413 
Dactylis glomerata, Poa trivialis, or Bromus mollis ; a very large excess of Agrostis 
vulgaris , Holcus lanatus, and Anthoxanthum odoratum, and some of Festuca ovina, 
and Arena elation ; and an actual deficiency, compared with plot 2, of two of the 
Arenas , pubescens and Jlavescens, and of Lolium perenne. That is to say, after the 
discontinuance of the dung, the greater growth of grasses with, than without, the 
ammonia-salts is chiefly due to a greater prominence, and a greater luxuriance, of the 
poorer species, Agrostis vulgaris , Holcus lanatus , Anthoxanthum odoratum, } and Festuca 
ovina. 
Whilst, without the ammonia-salts, Leguminosse greatly increased in prominence, 
with them the quantity remained so small that the deficiency compared with plot 2 
increased from year to year, the result being mainly due to the relatively deficient 
growth of Lathyrus pratensis. 
Of total Miscellanese, with a great relative deficiency on plot 1 in the first separation - 
year, there was subsequently even a slight excess. This was in fact exclusively due 
to the very much greater growth of Rumex Acetosa. Indeed, almost all the other 
miscellaneous species show either an average or an increasing relative deficiency with 
the ammonia-salts ; the most marked decline, compared with plot 2, being in Plantago 
lanceolata , Achilleoj Millefolium , and Ranunculus repens and R. bidbosus. We have 
then, where the ammonia-salts were applied, a greater prominence of individual mis¬ 
cellaneous species, and especially of Rumex Acetosa , as the excess of available nitrogen 
relatively to the available supply of other constituents became the more marked. 
Upon the whole, notwithstanding the large unrecovered residue of the manurial 
constituents remaining in the soil, the approximation in the botanical composition of 
the herbage to that without manure is very obvious on plot 2 after the cessation of 
the application of the dung. It is, however, much less so on plot 1 with the ammonia- 
salts. It is true that, on both plots, some of the better and freer-growing grasses 
decline, and poorer and more meagrely-growing ones gain in prominence ; but these 
do so in the main in a much greater degree with the partially forced, but at the same 
time restricted, growth under the influence of the ammonia-salts. That there was, on 
plot 1, a supply of available nitrogen in excess of that of the available mineral con¬ 
stituents, was quite obvious from the increased predominance of gramineous herbage, 
with at the same time dark green leafy growth, and relatively less tendency to mature. 
Under these circumstances, too—and the nitrogen being supplied in a condition in 
which it is much more rapidly available than the greater part of that in dung, but less 
rapidly distributing than in nitrate of soda—it is to be expected that the more super¬ 
ficially rooting species should be the more favoured; especially if they are also such as 
generally prevail under conditions of little competition with more free-growing species. 
8 s 
MDCCCLXXXIL 
