44 FLOWERS OF THE FIELDS AND MEADOWS 



Wild Carrot (Daucus Carota, L.) 



So far there have been no traces of the Wild Carrot found in 

 early deposits. In the North Temperate Zone it is found in Europe, 

 N. Africa, N. Asia, as far east as India. It has been introduced into 

 Nc America. Though common, it is not known in N. Perth, Banff, 

 Main Argyll, E. Sutherland, the Orkneys. 



The Wild Carrot is a common meadow species growing in fields 

 and meadows, or upland pastures on dry soils. The railway banks 

 have now become a permanent habitat for it in many places. On 

 rising ground it is especially common, and on hillsides amongst such 

 plants as Great Burnet, Devil's Bit Scabious, Ox-eye Daisy, Knap- 

 weed, Goats Beard, &c. It is also frequently to be seen by the 

 wayside. 



Fairly tall, erect, rigid, with a stiff, wiry stem, sparingly branched, 

 clothed with bristles, and striated, Wild Carrot is distinguished by its 

 foliage apart from its curiously nest-like umbels of flowers. The radical 

 leaves are oblong with lanceolate leaflets with lobes on each side of 

 the common stalk. The upper leaves are more triangular and larger, 

 with sheathing leaf-stalks, thrice branched. 



At first the umbel of flowers is cup-shaped or hollow, and this with 

 its numerous rays and small deeply divided bracts or leaflike organs 

 in the partial involucre or whorl of leaflike organs give it the appear- 

 ance of a bird's nest. 



There is a bright-red flower in the centre; the others white. The 

 fruit is bristly, bearing numerous hooked spines. The stem is usually 

 i ft. to 1 8 in. in height. Flowers are to be found in July and August. 

 The plant is a biennial, propagated by seeds. 



Compared with other umbellifers the flowers are large and con- 

 spicuous in proportion to the size and height of the stem. The 

 umbels are white and purple in the centre, and bear a row of ray 

 florets. The styles are erect, short, and thick. It is visited by 

 numerous insects, and cross-pollination is in this way ensured. 



Sixty-one insects have been noticed, 19 Diptera, 10 Coleoptera, 

 28 Hymenoptera, 2 Lepidoptera, 2 Hemiptera. 



The fruits are provided with hooks which catch in the wool and 

 fur of passing animals, and it is therefore dispersed by animals. 



Wild Carrot is addicted to a sand soil and it is therefore a sand 

 plant. 



It is infested by the fungi Plasmopora nivea, Phomis sanguino- 



