COMMON WEEDS OF THE 

 FARM AND GARDEN 



CHAPTER I 



WHAT WEEDS ARE, AND HOW THEY AFFECT 

 OUR CROPS AND STOCK 



" Everything that grows without being sown or planted, among a Crop 

 that has been sown or planted, is in that Place a Weed. The whole Benefit 

 of the Tillage was intended for the Crop, and this robs it of a Part." 



THOMAS HALE, The Complcat Body of Husbandly, 1756. 



IT is frequently stated that " a weed is a plant out of 

 place," meaning that it is a plant growing in such a 

 position and under such conditions that it is interfering 

 in some way with a cultivated crop, rendering a lawn 

 or a gravel drive unsightly, or in some other way making 

 itself objectionable. For our present purpose we may 

 consider that a weed is any plant, of whatever nature, 

 which is found growing where the agriculturist or 

 horticulturist has not placed it and does not desire 

 it to grow. Thus, from this point of view, just as the 

 common poppy is a weed in the wheat field, so would 

 wheat equally be a weed if growing amongst the 

 gardener's Shirley poppies ; and just as thistles are 

 weeds among the potato crop, so are potatoes " out of 

 place " and properly classed as weeds when self-sown 

 and found flourishing in a bed of carrots. Potatoes, 

 oats, or turnips may alike be weeds if they interfere 

 in any way with man's cultivated crops. At the time of 



A 



