Reading two-line headers in R

Question

What is the best way to read a file into R when the header has two necessary lines for the header?

This happens to me all the time, as people often use one line for

Answer 1

Almost the same method to the other answers, just shortening to 2 statements:

dat <- "trt   biomass    yield
crop    Mg/ha    bu/ac
C2      17.76   205.92
C2      17.96   207.86
CC      17.72   197.22
CC      18.42   205.20
CCW     18.15   200.51
CCW     17.45   190.59
P       3.09    0.00
P       3.34    0.00
S2      5.13    49.68
S2      5.36    49.72"

header <- sapply(read.table(text=dat, nrow=2), paste, collapse="_")
result <- read.table(text=dat, skip=2, col.names=header)

Result:

> head(result,2)
  trt_crop biomass_Mg/ha yield_bu/ac
1       C2         17.76      205.92
2       C2         17.96      207.86
...