SHEPHERD'S NEEDLE 123 



growing in the parish of Alsike, about ten British miles south of 

 Upsala, and in Sweden it is known as Alsike Klover. 



ESSENTIAL SPECIFIC CHARACTERS: 



80. Trifolium hybridum, L. Stems spreading, branched, erect, 

 leaves obovate, stipules ovate to lanceolate, flowers in globular de- 

 pressed heads, white or pink, calyx-teeth subulate. 



Shepherd's Needle (Scandix Pecten-Veneris, L.) 



The Shepherd's Needle is known from its present distribution 

 throughout the North Temperate Zone in Europe, North Africa, 

 \V. Asia, as far as the N.W. of India. In Great Britain it is not 

 found in Mid Lanes, Westmorland, Kirkcudbright, Stirling, S. Perth, 

 but occurs in the West Highlands except in Cantire and S. Ebudes, 

 E. Sutherland, the Hebrides, and the Orkneys from Ross southwards, 

 ascending to 1000 ft. in Yorkshire. Watson regards it merely as a 

 colonist. 



Shepherd's Needle is a common cornfield weed, growing amid the 

 corn, where it is accompanied by Corn Buttercup, Poppies, Charlock, 

 Heart's Ease, White Campion, Spurrey, Alsike Clover, Fool's Parsley, 

 Field Madder, and other equally widespread followers of man and the 

 plough. 



Though usually consisting of several stems, Shepherd's Needle often 

 has only one, and is not very tall, but branched, ascending, downy, 

 with a purple stem below and purple stripes. The leaves are light 

 green, deeply divided, with lobes on either side of the stalk, delicately 

 cut, sheathed at the base, and finely fringed with hairs at the margin. 



The flowers are in small umbels of 2 rays, with no general involucre, 

 the partial whorl of leaf-like organs being much divided. Before 

 pollination the involucre consists of 5 simple entire leaves, afterwards, 

 even if only one flower is pollinated, they branch repeatedly. The 

 flowers are white, 5-7, with petals blunt at the tip, the outermost 

 the largest, spreading, with the tips turned in. The bracts in the 

 involucre are divided into two halfway. The beak of the fruit is three 

 times as long as the fruit. The fruit is rough, flattened on one side, 

 finely furrowed on the other, with hairy edges. 



The plant is not more than i ft. high. The flowers bloom in 

 June and July. Venus's Comb, as the Shepherd's Needle is also 

 called, is an annual, coming up spontaneously from seed. 



The flowers are polygamous, small, and inconspicuous. There may 

 be male flowers and bisexual flowers, and they may be homogamous, 



