Are the creeping pygmies a friend or an enemy?

All lovers of summer cottages and estates know this plant. On the one hand, it is a hard weed, on the other - a good feed for livestock and a well-known medicinal plant. We are talking about such grass as creeping wheat. So, what kind of a multifaceted plant is this?

This perennial herb of their family of cereals grows almost everywhere. Its height is 0.5-1.2 m. The creeper has a very long and highly branched rhizome. Often it reaches several meters in length. Rhizome is very nodular, creeping. Despite the fact that the root of the wheatgrass is relatively fragile, it often penetrates up to 1 m deep into the soil. This is a polymorphic plant. Its leaves can be of different colors: from blue to bright green.

Sheet plates flat. Their bases are bare or slightly pubescent. The grass of the wheatgrass produces a spikelet up to 15 cm long. It is straight, with fairly densely spiked spikelets, reaching 1-1.5 cm. There are up to 7 flowering spikelets with lanceolate scales in the ear. One overgrown plant can produce about 10,000 seed-grains. Pyrus gives special seeds - they grow even after 10-12 years. The plant blooms in June, and its seeds ripen from July to September. Despite such endurance of seedgrass seed, the main method of propagation of this herb is rhizomes. It is estimated that, on 1 hectare of land, the length of the roots of this grass reaches several hundred kilometers, and up to 250 million kidneys are located on them. The puffy creeping occurs most often in meadows, coastal sands, glades, in the steppes, in weedy places, on the roadside, and, of course, in our fields and orchards. His favorite soil: rich in humus, well-moistened, marshy or loose sandy. This plant does not like too compacted soils.

The pike often grows rhizomes at a depth of 2-15 cm. It is noticed that the more humid the weather is from spring to autumn, the better this grass grows.

Although wheatgrass is creeping and is a weed that brings a headache to farmers, gardeners and gardeners, one can not but admit that it is also an excellent food for pets. It is best eaten by all kinds of livestock in pastures (especially before the beginning of the ear). This grass is also well eaten by rabbits, poultry and other herbivores. It is indispensable for the grass to be creeping and as hay harvested for the winter. It contains many different nutrients that help increase the weight of fattened animals and improve milk yield.

For centuries, the creepers used to eat creeping food. It is known that soups, garnishes, salads, flour, surrogate coffee were prepared from it.

The rhizome of cattail grass is long used for medical purposes. They contain: polysaccharide triticin, carotene, starch, ascorbic acid, saponins, gum, mannitol, sugars, iron, silicic acid, amino acids, manganese, zinc, calcium, mucus, sodium, pectin, inositol, vitamins B, A. Raw materials are harvested Spring and autumn. The roots are scooped out, shaken, washed with water, wilted on the street and dried in a dryer or in the shade. Stored up to 2 years. Use rhizomes as an anti-inflammatory, sudorific, enveloping, diuretic, expectorant, dermatological, laxative. It is recommended to use poultices for removing salts from the body. Decoction of the roots used for rheumatism, gout, inflammation of the digestive tract, respiratory diseases, bile and urolithiasis, hemorrhoids, furunculosis, skin diseases and many others. This drug is still good because its contraindications have not been established.

There are many ways to combat this malicious weed. These include: depletion (soil disco), weeding, digging up rhizomes, strangulation (covering the area with grass with cardboard, film) The most modern and controversial of them is the use of herbicides. For the destruction of this herb, the best herbicides are Raudap, Glyphosad, Uragan, and Nabu. The complexity of using these drugs is that all the cereals and some other plants die on the area of the land they have processed.