TYPE IN GRASSES AS IMPORTANT AS TYPE IN CATTLE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume L, Issue 3925, 2 April 1929, Page 1

TYPE IN GRASSES AS IMPORTANT AS TYPE IN CATTLE.

IMPORTANT RESULTS FROM EXPERIMENTS. During the course oif his address tr. farmers at Glen Orou'a on Tuesday, Mr. E. Bruce Levy, of the . Fields Division of the Department of Agriculture, stated that it seemed as if '.many important results were going to be obtained from grass and clover trials that were being conducted at the present time. For ins'tanlce, the number .of strains of a particular grass or clover, wtould be more than the actual species themselves. At the Research Station, 104 ryes were sown but 28 only of the 108 had turned out to be true perennial ryes. As time went on, type in grasses would be regarded as equally as important as type in cows. The only time type of perennial rye harvested in New Zealand, it would seem, was that from Hawke’s Bay. Of 22 Hawke’s Bay samples grown, 15 were of the true perennial type, whereas with the Southern ryes, none had come true. There seelmed to be a lot of Italian rye blood in uUany of the socalled perennial types sown. The various strains were being sown throughout New Zealand on different types of soil for the purposes of further investigations. It was quite evident the perennial iye grass question had to be cleared up. There was no use trying Lc sow-down pastures with seed that would not give a true result. Mr. Levy added that he had been astonished at the position as revehled by the experimental sowings at the Research Station. Fortunately, Neiv Zealand was a good White clover country and was able to produce good strains of seed. He urged farmers always to sow New Zealand white clover, as the imported strains went out of existence in a year or two after sowing. The queistion of strains also held good with cocksfoot, although that grass had been relegated to sec ond place in pasture mixtures, owing to the rough, rank feed iit produced. Farmers were gradually get- . jig away from rough and rank pastures. The position with red clovers was not at all good. At Home three or four types had been discovered. The broad red lasted in the ground about 2 years and the Montgomery about 2 years and the Mon'togmery red 3 years or longer. The red clover in New Zealand was of the broad red type, which lasted only a 'year and so there were tremendous possibilities of improving the length of red clover life in New Zealand by obtaining a strain that wbuld stand heavier grazing. In answer to a question, Mr. Levy stated! that an endeapour whs peing made to delete the term cowgrass from New Zealand. There was no' such thing as eowgrass and if a farmer ordered it, it would come out of the s'alme bag as red clover. Someone had said the only difference between eowgrass - ,and red clover was twopence per lb. (Laughter). The theory that one had a. hollow and the other eC*solid stem did not hold. ,