YELLOW ROCKET 



Flowers. — Yellow criicifcrs, in showy paniclcd racemes. 

 Pods erect or slightly spreading, oblusely four-angled. 



This is the first of our yellow Mustards. It is found 

 in the fields, where it marks the course of a tiny runlet 

 or gathers round a bit of low- 

 land in pasture or meadow; its 

 presence is sunshine. Each 

 plant consists of a bunch of 

 erect, leafy stems a foot high 

 or more, branching into flower- 

 stems, each crowned with a 

 loose spike of little yellow 

 flowers, looking not unlike 

 yellow Sweet Alyssum. The 

 bloom is profuse, and the 

 blooming season lasts well 

 through May. A trail of seed- 

 pods is left in the wake of the 

 little crucifers as they con- 

 tinue to bloom along the 

 lengthening stem. The lower 

 flowers open while the top of 

 the cluster is closely packed 

 with short, narrow buds. By 

 June the yellow is past, the 

 brownish green has come, and 

 the plant is swallowed up by 

 the surrounding foliage and summer growth. Gray 

 reports it as apparently introduced, but indigenous 

 from Lake Superior northward and westward. It is 

 one of our most attractive early flowers and is known 

 as Yellow Rocket, Winter-Cress, Wild Mustard, and 



Herb of St. Barbara. 



109 



Yellow Rocket. Barbarea 

 vulgaris 



