HERBACEOUS VEGETATION OF CLEARED LAND. 



40*,) 



are conspicuous. l>y midsummer the stems are -'J to 6 decimeters 

 (1 or 2 feet) high, wand like and very leafy. In early autumn the 

 large plume-like, greenish or purplish panicles of numerous small 

 heads are seen everywhere, waving gracefully in the wind and making 

 every fence: corner a place of beauty. The plant when full grown has 

 stout stems 6 to 12 decimeters (2 to 4 feet) high. It is nowhere more 

 abundant and showy than along the banks of the Dismal Swamp 

 canal, where it is associated with vast quantities of Panicum pro- 

 life rum and P. crus-galli. Other species of Eupatorium with white 

 flowers are abundant, notably E. linear if olium and E. rotund if oliutn, 

 the latter preferring rather moist soil. Asters, especially A. ericoides, 

 with numerous small, white-rayed heads, are prominent in the land- 













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Fiu. 70. — Eupatorium capillifoliuin on roadside near Waliaceton, Va. 



scape. Golden-rods are likewise conspicuous, S. canadensis being 

 the common roadside species. Erigeron canadensis and Ambrosia 

 artemisiaefolia arc exceedingly abundant. A wry common plant 

 along ditches in fields, less frequently covering the ground in low 

 woods, is a tall, wandlike grass, Erianthus contortus (fig. 77), which 

 in autumn is hardly inferiorto Eupatorium cap ill 'folium, as a character 

 plant of this formation. 



Near towns and along the more-traveled highways, ruderal plants, 

 introduced weeds, usually conquer the indigenous growth, but this is 

 not always the case. For example, on the outskirts of even the larger 

 seaport cities waste land is frequently occupied by an association of 

 Baccharis Indimifolia, Eupatorium rap Mi folium, and Andropogon 

 vtrginicus. 



