CHAPTER XII 



The fruits of this genus, like all the others we have considered so far, 

 have a capillary pappus. The Ambrosia tribe, in spite of its melli- 

 fluous name, contains some ugly weeds; the genus Ambrosia includes 

 the rag-weed, so troublesome in Eastern States, but on our coast the 

 allied genus Franseria is more common, and equally weedy. These 

 weeds have some redeeming features; the foliage is always pleasing, 

 the leaves being pinnately divided, often very delicately. On the 

 beach, or in sandy wastes, the plants are grey, sometimes silky, but 

 in rich cultivated soil they have, like the fleabane, green foliage when 

 everything else is brown or gray. Another genus of this tribe is Xan- 

 thium, the cocklebur, the impersonation of total depravity among 

 plants. The flowers of these genera might not be recognized as be- 

 longing to Composite; the heads of staminate flowers are clustered, 

 but are inconspicuous; on the same plant are the pistillate flowers 

 only one or two in a head, surrounded by involucres that are covered 

 with spines, the hooked spines of the cocklebur being specially 

 vicious. 



Many of our common Composite are included in the sunflower 

 tribe and two or three allied tribes that the amateur finds difficult to 

 distinguish. The common sunflower, Helianthus annuus, L,inn., 

 supposed to be the ancestor of the cultivated sunflower, is referred to 

 in Chapter XVI as taking possession of cultivated land during the 

 summer and autumn; it grows also along streams and In warm, loose 

 soil generally, and may be found in flower almost any month. En- 

 celia Californica, Nutt., of the south, is often mistaken for the sun- 

 flower ; it is a handsome, strongly scented perennial, growing in 

 masses and blooming very fully in spring time; the heads are some- 

 what smaller than sunflowers, usually about two and a half inches in 

 diameter; the plants are bushy, being woody at the base like a mar- 

 gueiite, but they are not so coarse and rough as a sunflower. Their 

 method of pollination does not, I think, differ from that of the sun- 

 flower. 



Of the Compositae mentioned in the Supplement to Chapter IX, the 

 tidy-tips, Layia platyglossa, Gray, is nearly related to the sunflower 

 and has the same methods ; another, Layia glandttlosa, H. & A., and 

 its variety rosea, with ray flowers white and rosy respectively, are 

 very widely distributed in sandy soil, and are successful in securing 

 insect patronage ; they can be readily recognized by any one familiar 

 with tidy-tips. Leptosyne Douglasii, DC., belongs to the sunflower 

 tribe and Bceria gracilis, Gray, to a very nearly allied tribe ; the 

 groundsel, Senecio Calif or nica, DC., belongs to a group separated 

 from these mainly because of its capillary pappus. Another groundsel 



91 



