Page:Zacaton as a paper-making material (IA zacatonaspaperma309bran).pdf/14

 BULLETIN

s

309,

U.

S.

DEPARTMENT OF AGEICULTURE.

summer, for my brother says that all through the present summer it has been cold enough for an overcoat at night in the town of Sayula, where he resides. During January, he says that it reaches to near zero and at 10 o'clock the next davit is up to 70° again.

Mr. O. F. Cook corroborates Mr. McE wen's observations regarding In the relative coolness of the climate in which this grass thrives. Guatemala, where the former has noted the plant especially, he found the

same

conditions.

Figure S shows a comparatively sparse stand of zacaton on the Vulcan de Agua, near Antigua, Guatemala, one of the early localities from which the plant was collected.

Figure 9, from a photograph taken in Guatemala, shows the grass promptly claiming the neglected portion of a formerly cultivated field on a terraced hillside along the road between Totonicapam and Quez alt enango, Guatemala, showing also in the

middle

distance,

on the mountain slope below the pines, a characteristic

wire-grass

formation

contending with the

pines for suprem-

—Cross section of a leaf blade,

x

showing hypodermal stereome, the large water-storage tissue, the palisade tissue, and the mestome surrounded by a parenchyma sheath and a thick-walled mestome sheath.

Fig.

6.

240,

acy. these

Both figures

of are

from negatives

made under

the direction of Mr.

Cook by Mr.

C. B. Doyle, of the

Bureau of Plant Industry. The grass is said to flower from August to October, depending upon altitude and other conditions, and usually attains a height of 5 to 7 feet. The usable portions of the roots vary in length from 2 to 30 inches. The diameter of the roots range from one sixty-fourth to three thirty-seconds of an inch. They are gathered at all seasons of the year, peons digging them up with an implement resembling a hoe in shape. After washing, cleaning, and drying, the roots are cut from the grass, graded, and separated according to quality, length, and color, and finally baled ready for shipment. Vera Cruz and Tampico are the chief exporting ports, while France, German}', and the United States are the chief users of the brushes into which the roots are manufactured. Roots of a pale yellow, a decidedly characteristic color, are preferred by the trade. It is estimated that an acre of grass yields a ton of marketable roots and at least 3 tons of At present the tops are not used in any way. It seems likely tops. that root operators might find it worth while to attempt the utilization '