Couch-grass

Couch-grass (Triticum repens), also called Wheat-grass, Dog-grass, Quickens, and Squitch or Quitch, a grass which, although of the same genus with wheat, is a widespread and troublesome weed. Its perennial creeping root-stocks render it extremely difficult of extirpation; they are carefully gathered out of land under cultivation; but in times of scarcity have been employed as human food, as a source of beer, as a domestic medicine, and more frequently as fodder. They are sometimes useful in binding sand into pasturage of inferior quality. Cut early, couch-grass makes very good hay.