Bindweed

“ The greater bindweed, perhaps, is the most difficult to get rid of, and is especially troublesome among evergreens. The tender, semi-transparent shoots stand quite erect under evergreens until they touch the lower branches ”

“ As a rule the annual weeds are kept under with comparative ease, it usually being the perennials with spreading roots which give the real trouble. In preparing a piece of ground, every piece of such root—be it of couch grass, bindweed, or what not—should be picked out and burnt. Then, if, through several seasons, every shoot of perennial weed be pulled off directly it is seen, they will eventually be subdued or even vanquished. ”

“ When it is downy, the plant forms almost the whole nest, as is the case with the flax-leaved bindweed; when smooth, it forms only the framework, destined to support a crumbling mass of micropus, as is the case with the small bindweed. ”

“ The Hooded Bindweed (C. sepium) is one of the most distinguished of our wild flowers, and it is almost impossible to see its large, pure white flowers ornamenting the hedge without desiring to acquire them. In general form it is like C. arvensis, but very much larger. Instead of being content to twine among low-growing herbs as that species, it climbs up the thickets to a height of 6 or 7 feet. In addition to the calyx this species has an enveloping pair of large inflated heart-shaped bracts—the “hood” of its popular name. The rootstock is thick and tuberous. ”

“ Gray—is very similar to the above, but may be distinguished from it by the pair of large, thin bracts immediately below the calyx and enveloping it.
Another very pretty species is C. villosus, Gray. This is widely distributed, but not very common. Its trailing stems and foliage are of a velvety sage-gray throughout, and its small flowers of a yellowish cream-color. The hastate leaves are shapely, and the whole plant is charming when grown away from dust.
The common European bindweed—C. arvensis, L.—is to the farmer a very unwelcome little immigrant. In fields it becomes a serious pest ”

“ Prepare a bed, say four by six feet, or larger if you choose, and rake it off smoothly. The seeds are extremely minute. Take a pinch of them as if they were snuff, and then do by them what everybody ought to do by snuff,—sift them evenly all over the ground. Then just touch the ground with the tips of the rake-teeth, stirring it very lightly. Take a spade and spat the surface gently, so as to bring the soil home to the seed. Keep weeds away, and for the rest do nothing but enjoy the labor of your hands. It will come up of itself every year, and become a weed if you wish it to. ”

“ From a berry slightly covered with soil, a weed, not unlike the common pig-weed, in the rapidity of its growth and the greenness of its stalk, shoots up during the summer four or five feet in height. During the winter its stalks harden, and in the spring, in a brown coat, and with the dignity of a young tree, it proudly displays its tufts of pale, tapering leaves. In three or four summers more it will fling its limbs over the planter's cottage—and cast upon the ground a broad and delightful shade. ”

“ These are minute weed seedlings, but yet slightly rooted, and easily treated by simple dislodgment. A hot, windy day is a good time to hoe between your plants, because the wind and sun kill the uprooted weeds in a short time. They dry up, and there is but little to remove. On a damp cloudy day if a disturbed bit—no matter how small—of the pestiferous couch grass rolls near the base of a plant and remains there, it will send down its roots among those of the plant, and it is almost impossible to get them out without taking the plant up. ”

“ The seed-pods of the Milkweeds are most interesting; rough on the outside, they are beautifully finished within, with a fine, smooth, light lining. The silky plumes of the flat-brown seeds are closely folded together and the seeds lie overlapping like the scales of a fish. The light green outside of the Butterfly-Weed pod, tinged with crimson-tawny, becomes with age a fine tree-trunk gray. ”

“ All these are very easily eradicated when small but the red root is an exceedingly47 hard weed to pull once it has got a grip on the ground and it must be taken out root and all or it will come up again with not one but several stout stalks, and a more tenacious hold than ever on the soil; it is one of the weeds which are constantly eluding detection until they have gained several inches in height when they defy the hoe and cultivator and call for strenuous hand work! ”

“ Tumbleweeds.—Incidentally, the foregoing pages contain some account of seeds and fruits that are carried by the aid of wind, in connection with their distribution by other methods; but there are good reasons for giving other examples of seeds carried by the wind. There is a very common weed found on waste ground and also in fields and gardens, which on good soil, with plenty of room and light, grows much in the shape of a globe with a diameter of two to three feet. ”

“ The weeding is done, whilst the plant is still so tender and elastic as that it may rise again readily after the operation, and it is a remarkable illustration of the studied tenderness with which the cultivation is watched, that the women and children who are employed to weed it, are generally instructed to do so against the wind, in order that the breeze may lift the stems as soon as they have left them, instead of allowing them to grow crooked, by lying too long upon the ground. ”

“ You will also see on this slide several cells in which these tiny spores s are forming, ready to burst out and swim; for this green weed is merely a collection of cells, like the single-celled plants on land. Each cell can [Pg 177] work as a separate plant; it feeds, grows, and can send out its own young spores.
This deep olive-green feathery weed (2, Fig. 63) , of which a piece is magnified under the next microscope (2, Fig. 65) , is very different. It is a higher plant, and works harder for its living, using the darker rays of sunlight which penetrate into shady parts of the pool. ”

“ The seed of an Italian weed had been introduced with their corn, and was discovered in Switzerland!
Weeds are an extremely interesting group. A proverb about the hardiness and multiplication of weeds can be discovered in almost every language. "Ill weeds grow apace," Unkraut verbessert nicht, and so on. They are very common. In fact weeds, wayside, and freshwater plants, have by far the widest distribution of all. There are twenty-five species which can be found over at least half the entire land surface of the earth, and more than a hundred occupy a third of it. ”

“ Now if one thinks for a little over the cunning and ingenuity of these proceedings, it is obvious that each single weed has somehow learnt how to develop exactly at the right time. Those especially which are intended (by themselves) to form part of the seed mixtures must flower exactly at the same time as the corn. As a matter of fact, most seed mixtures are often full of weeds. In a single pound of clover seed, no less than 14,400 foreign seeds, including those of forty-four different weeds, have been discovered. ”

“ Common Bishop’s-weed rises up with a round straight stalk, sometimes as high as a man, but usually three or four feet high, beset with divers small, long and somewhat broad leaves, cut in some places, and dented about the edges, growing one against another, of a dark green colour, having sundry branches on them, and at the top small umbels of white flowers, which turn into small round seeds little bigger than Parsley seeds, of a quick hot scent and taste; the root is white and stringy; perishing yearly, and usually rises again on its own sowing. ”

“ Weeds under Cultivation.—For several years past the botanical department of Michigan Agricultural College has maintained a "weed garden," and has grown a hundred or more species of the most troublesome weeds in plots. Some curious results from the experiments are recorded by Prof. W. J. Beal in a paper read at the meeting, 1897, of the Society for the Promotion of Agricultural Science. The most vigorous and aggressive weeds seem to take on under cultivation the weakness and capriciousness of delicate cultivated plants. ”

“ Meadows and pastures, especially where the land is not fertile, abound in weeds that require two years or more to produce seeds, such as narrow-leaved dock, bitter dock, bull thistle, carrot, teasel, two kinds of mulleins, night-flowering catchfly, evening primrose, several kinds of fleabane, ox-eye daisy, orange hawkweed, two or three kinds of plantain, Canada thistle, hound's tongue, stick seed, sow thistle, horse nettle, buttercups, toad flax, silvery cinquefoil, and many more, not excluding some annuals, like crab-grass, tickle grass, pigeon grasses. ”

“ As it spreads along it tends to force out other plants.
"This weed, like the wild carrot, is really very lovely. Could such weeds be properly held down in small garden areas they would be very ornamental. I saw a little flower garden once, quite beautiful, with two small clumps, one of wild mustard and one of field daisy, among the other flowers.
"The seeds of the wild mustard, like those of the plantain and other weeds, get in with the grain seed and so cause constant trouble. Farmers feel that such weeds must be thoroughly gotten out of the fields. ”

“ In a few cases the plants break loose from the soil when mature and become tumble-weeds. (Some pigweeds, Russian thistle.)
11. Some seeds and seed-like fruits are furnished each with a balloon, or a sail, or with grappling hooks. (Dandelion, sticktights, burdock.)
12. Some remain with the dead plant long into winter, and when torn off by the wind or by birds, drift for long distances on the snow, often from one farm to another. (Pigweeds.)
13. Some have creeping root-stocks or tubers. ”

“ It is most important to know what the baby-plants will look like when they come up, because one has to weed hard in the warm showery weather, and if one is not careful, mignonette, sweet-peas, and poppies may go on the rubbish heap, and chickweed and purseley be left on the flower-bed; which, although it is what the birds like, will, later, be very disheartening to you. Of course, if your seeds are well marked, there will be less difficulty, but even then weeds will come up amongst them. ”

“ When the plants are full grown, and the leaves are become somewhat brittle, they are cut with a knife close to the ground. They are suffered to lie upon the ground for a little while, after which they are carried to the drying shed, where they are hung by pairs upon lines or ropes. When perfectly dry, the leaves are stripped from the stalks, and made into small bundles tied round with another leaf. These bundles are laid in heaps, and covered with blankets for about seven days to heat; after which they are closely stowed in casks for exportation. ”

“ A farmer buys clover seeds or grass seeds that were grown in some state that never before grew seeds that went onto his farm and thus he may get some new weeds. Seeds of alfalfa or some other crop bring new kinds of weeds, especially those of dodder. As every kind of weed goes onto a farm to stay there it follows that as a country becomes older the greater the number of kinds of weeds. ”

“ These produce such plenty of seeds, that it is very difficult to clear a field of them, if once they are suffered to grow till the seeds ripen. An extremely common weed in gardens and by roadsides is shepherd’s-purse, which is a very good specimen of the pouch-bearing plants of this tribe, its seed-vessels being exactly the figure of a heart. Lady-smock is 281often so abundant a weed in wet meadows as to make them all over white with their flowers. ”

“ Butter and Eggs. Toad-Flax. Linaria vulgaris Hill. Linaria Linaria (L.) Karst. Flowers yellow and orange; seeds dark brown or black, flat, circular or oval, surrounded by a broad wing-margin, the wing notched and covered by numerous fine radiating ridges, the surface of the seed roughened by numerous projecting points, seed, including its wing, 1.5–2 mm. long. Introduced from Europe. A vigorous weed in meadows, spreading by seeds and by root stocks.
Fig 166. Moth Mullein. Verbascum Blattaria L.
Moth Mullein. ”

“ Shortly after fertilization, the little rounded, flat-sided fruit begins to form inside the persistent pink calyx. At any time the spike-like racemes contain more bright pink buds and shining seeds than flowers. Familiarity alone breeds contempt for this plant, that certainly possesses much beauty. The troublesome and wide-ranging weed called lady's thumb is a near relative.
POKEWEED FAMILY (Phytolaccaceae) ”

“ Common throughout the Southwest, particularly on overgrazed rangelands and deserted clearings, this plant, also called “matchweed” or “turpentine-weed,” often occurs in almost pure stands. The resinous stems burn readily, throwing off black smoke. Most abundant on dry hills and mesas, 3,000 to 6,000 feet elevation, this perennial is found from 1,000 to 7,000 feet, blossoming from June to October. Bees obtain nectar and pollen from the small but densely crowded, yellow flower clusters. ”

“ The extraordinary tendency in some Begonias to develop leaves or leafy excrescences from their surfaces is elsewhere alluded to, and is, in reality, a species of hypertrophy or over-luxuriant growth.
In some flowers where the inferior ovary is supposed to be, in part at least, formed by a dilatation of the top of the flower-stalk, leaves have been met with proceeding from the surface of the ovary or fruit, as in Cratægus tanacetifolia, roses, pears, gooseberries, &c. ”