40 LIVING PLANTS 



tenacity of life is only displayed as long as 

 the roots remain undisturbed. A plant of 

 wild lettuce once pulled up dies as quickly as 

 any other plant. When mowed, the top that 

 is cut off dies as soon as ragweed, cocklebur, 

 horseweed or thistles do ; it possesses none of 

 the live-for-ever quality of purslane. Neither 

 has the root any recuperative force in itself. 

 If the stem be cut away well down into the 

 root, the whole plant dies, no shoots ever 

 starting up from the roots in the soil. 



The various characteristics enumerated 

 largely explain the success of the plant as an 

 introduced weed. In the central west, it is a 

 formidable rival of ragweed, horseweed, 

 cocklebur, jimsonweed, pigweed and other 

 tall-growing annual weeds, especially during 

 dry seasons. In July and August the plant 

 becomes most obnoxious, for then it sends up 

 the seed stalks. The heat and dryness which 

 are likely to occur at this season and retard 

 the growth of other plants, killing the small 

 and weak ones, give the conditions which 

 enable wild lettuce to gain the master^^ and 

 flourish in disheartening luxuriance. 



Not only has the plant the properties of a 

 weed, but it has the appearance of one. It 

 looks weedy. There is nothing about it that 

 will ever give it an aesthetic value. To city- 

 bred and country-bred observers ajike it will 



