55 
days: or, in the evening, it is bound into small sheaves, which are arranged in stooks, 
and, according to the weather, left for four or five days in the field to become ripe. In 
stook, the seed is little injured by rain. When the sheaves are dry, they are taken to the 
barn, and threshed during winter. 
Although Timothy seed is so small in size, still the amount produced is large. 
In favourable cases, Pinkert obtained 700—880 lbs. of seed per acre. Werner gives 260—700 lbs. Yield of seed. 
The price is always low, usually about 4d. per lb. Sprengel remarks, that it can be used for making 
a kind of meal, which is as good as that made from Glyceria fluitans, K. 
In Silesia, seed is separated from a mixture with Red clover. Separation is very easy 
since Timothy-seed is very small, and detaches much more readily than that of Red clover. 
When cereals follow Timothy, the fodder-grass remains in part between the furrows, and 
grows up with the cereal, especially if the ground has been little tilled. Because of this, 
older writers regarded it as a weed. Among the cereals it vegetates luxuriantly, and sends 
up tall culms with long spikes, very rich in seed. In the case of winter-wheat, it is easy to 
obtain Timothy seed as an acessory product, because both ripen together. The seeds can 
readily be separated by sieves having a mesh of 1—1'/2 mm. Pinkert obtained in this 
way, a minimum of 88 lbs. per acre. 
Timothy seed comes principally from N. America, also from Eastern Germany, and Commercial 
Austria. There is no sufficient experimental evidence to show whether American or Euro- ssed. 
pean seed succeeds best with us: — in the experimental field at Zurich, no difference was 
noticed. American seed is usually purer than European, which often contains 10 to 20 °/o Impurities. ; 
of impurity, and at times, even more. A part of this impurity consists of the small seeds f 
of weeds. ‘Timothy seed exported from Breslau, for example, often contains a large percent- 
age of the seeds of — Corn Chamomile (Anthemis arvensis), Bladder Campion (Silene inflata), 
Chickweed (Cerastium triviale), Corn Spurry (Spergula arvensis), Forget-me-not (Myosotis 
intermedia), Plantain (Plantago lanceolata), Sorrel (Rumex Acetosella), Self-heal (Prunella 
vulgaris), Sand-wort (Arenaria serpyllifolia), Ox-eye daisy (Chrysanthemum Leucanthemum), 
and Dodder (Cuscuta Trifolii). When Timothy seed is separated from a mixture with Red 
Clover, the small seeds of the clover Dodder, if present, come through the sieves along with 
the Timothy seed. It is true that Dodder does not attack Timothy ; but if such Timothy 
seed is sown along with clover, the Dodder attacks the latter. In purchasing seed to mix 
with clover, it is very necessary, therefore, to take care that the Timothy as well as the 
clover contains no Dodder seed. So far as we know, American Timothy seed never con- 
tains Dodder. 
Being cheap, this seed is rarely adulterated. At times grey sand is mixed with it. Adulterations. 
By superficial examination, this adulteration is readily overlooked, since Timothy seed has 
the same colour as the sand; on close inspection, however, the fraud is at once detected. 
Seed amounts to be sown. Commercial seed usually consists of the caryopsis enclosed Seed quality. 
within the pales (figs. 5 and 6). When the seed is well ripened, or if it has been strongly 
threshed, the pales detach, and a large part of the seed is naked (fig. 7). Good, fresh, 
seed is recognised by the greyish-white, almost silvery tint of the pales; dark grey pales 
indicate that the seed has been injured by rain. Analyses of 170 samples, extending from 
1876 to 1882, showed an average purity of 96.6 °/o, and a germinating power of 85 °%o. é 
1 lb. of pure seed contains 1,170,500 grains. American seed is usually smaller than Ger- 
