VERNONIA NOVEBORACENSIS. 



IRON-WEED; FLAT-TOP. 



NATURAL ORDER, COMrOSIT.K. (ASTERACK.K OK I.IXDLEV.) 



Vernonia Novehoracensis, Willdenow. — Leaves numerous, lanceolate, serrulate, rough ; 

 cyme fastigiate ; scales of involucre filiform at the ends. (\V<jocrs Class- Hook of liotatiy. 

 See also Gray's Mainta! of the Botany of t tie Northern United States, and Chapman's 

 Flora of the Southern United States.) 



HIS pretty native flower is well known by sight to most 

 people, for, growing two or three feet high, and in great 

 abundance in low grounds in the districts allotted to it by Na- 

 ture, and being of so conspicuous a color, it is readily recognized, 

 even by those who take no special interest in botany. To the 

 farmer, indeed, it is only too well known, as it is apt to be trouble- 

 some when it finds itself in congenial soil ; and authors on 

 agricultural subjects are not, therefore, accustomed to speak of 

 it in very eulogistic terms. Thus Dr. Darlington writes in his 

 "Agricultural Botany" : " The plant is quite common in moist, 

 low grounds and along fence-rows. Its worthless character and 

 coarse, hard stems cause it to be regarded as a rather obnoxious 

 weed in our meadows; and of course it is carefully eradicated 

 by all neat farmers." Dr. Michener, in his " Manual of Weeds," 

 also has a bad word for it. He says it is " a worthless and 

 troublesome weed in moist bottom lands, unless carefully dis- 

 posed of. Being a rank per-annual, the proper means is to 

 destroy the root either by ploughing or grubbing." It is prob- 

 ably from the "coarse, hard stems," alluded to by Dr. Darling- 

 ton, that the plant has obtained the common name of Iron 

 Weed. 



