COMPOSITAE « COMPOSITE FAMILY 
PASTURE THISTLE 
Cirsium pumilum (Nutt.) Spreng. 
This native biennial is one of the most handsome as well as the 
most fragrant of our common Thistles. It is to be found in fields 
from Maine and Minnesota, south to Pennsylvania, Delaware 
and Iowa, blooming from 
July to September. 
The stem is stout, simple 
or somewhat branched and 
quite leafy. It grows 1-3 
feet high from a thick, a 
solid branching root. The 
leaves, green above and 
below, are 3-7 inches long, 
and the lower are petioled. 
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The large heads of pur- 
ple, lilac or whitish flowers 
are 2-3 inches broad and 
about 2 inches high. The 
pappus is composed of num- 
erous silky white bristles. 
Country boys like to pull 
the florets from the re- 
ceptacle and chew the 
nectaries. 
The Common or Bull 
Thistle, Cirsium lanceolatum 
(L.) Hill, is another immigrant from Europe common in pastures and 
along roadsides. It is biennial and the stout branched stem grows 
3-5 feet high and is leafy to the top. The leaves are dark green, 
lanceolate and deeply lobed. They are 3-6 inches long, the lowest at 
times even larger, and their bases extend down on the stem. The 
lobes are tipped with stout prickles and the margins and bases are 
bristly. The heads, 2 inches high and equally broad, are mostly 
solitary at the ends of branches. The bracts of the involucre are 
covered with cottony hairs and tipped with slender prickles. The 
flowers are dark purple. 
Ha, prickle-arméd knight, Thou like a maiden art 
How oft the world hath cursed Who best can find protection 
thee, k 
Thou pestilence of Earth, ae ae 
The beldame who hath nursed From idleness’ infection. 
thee! The Thistle—MiILrES M. DAWSON 
383 
