636 Junior Naturalist Monthly. 



SUGGESTIONS FOR STUDY. 



Every school should have a tripod lens which zvill not cost more 

 than ^0 cents. Through this lens boys and girls will be able to see 

 how wonderfully some plants are made. 



Remove one of the burdock hooks and look at it through the lens. 

 Notice how sharp the hooks are. If you remove one of the seeds you 

 will find two kinds of hairs present, some situated on the end of the 

 seed and others lying among the seeds. You will notice that the hairs 

 on the end of the seed are not so long as those on the dandelion. The 

 dandelion, you know, is carried by the wind and burdock seeds by 

 means of the little hooks on the seed which attach themselves to animals. 

 You see in this way they do not need the little balloons with which the 

 dandelions are furnished. 



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Fig. I. — Furniture made from burdocks. 



In one small seed-head of the burdock I counted twenty-six seeds 

 and it was not a very large head. This suggests an example in arith- 

 metic. If there were forty heads in the plant each containing twenty-six 

 seeds, how many plants might be produced? Now you see why bur- 

 docks should not be permitted to go to seed on farms, in gardens or 

 along the wayside. Can boys and girls do anything to help get rid of 

 the burdock? 



A WINTER BOUQUET. 



When you go afield to gather the burdocks, you will find many other 

 plants still standing erect above the snow. Take some of the old stalks 

 back to school for the nature-study table. As you come to look at them 

 more closely you will find some of them wonderfully made. 



Notice the teasel. How tall it grows ! Can you not see as the wind 

 shakes it back and forth that the seeds will be scattered far from the 

 parent plant? Do you find any seeds on the old teasel stalk at this 

 season ? 



