THE RIBWORT OR PLANTAIN FAMILY 139 



crops, in which it increases rapidly by the distribution of its 

 seeds with commercial clover seed, the market value of which 

 is depreciated by this impurity. Farmers who use only first 

 quality red clover seed and who pull the first plants of this weed 

 that occur in their clover seed crop will soon rid their farms 

 of this pest. Special cleaning apparatus is required to separate 

 the seed from red clover seed. Farmers may separate small 

 quantities by spreading the clover seed on damp canvas; the 

 plantain seeds will quickly gum themselves to the cloth and the 

 clover seeds will drop off when the canvas is inverted. 



ALLIED SPECIES: Hoary Plantain (Plantago media L.). 

 This plant is much less frequently seen than Ribgrass but it has 

 the same wide range, as the seed is distributed with grass seed. 

 It is deep-rooted and more difficult to eradicate from lawns 

 than the other species here mentioned. Leaves ovate, thickly 

 covered with white hairs, short-stalked and always lying close 

 to the ground in a dense rosette. The flower stalks are slender, 

 about 1 foot high. Flower heads showy by reason of their 

 purple and white stamens, at first oval, gradually elongating 

 to cylindrical spikes 1 to 3 inches long. Flowers pleasantly 

 fragrant. Capsules oblong, 2 to 3-seeded. 



The seed (Plate 75, fig. 72) is of the boat-shaped class, 

 about the same size as that of Ribgrass but thinner and flatter, 

 often somewhat twisted, with the edges not so roundly turned 

 in around the groove which bears the scar. It shows an indistinct, 

 shallow groove or constriction across the outer face just below 

 the middle, indicating the part of the seed which fitted into 

 the top of the capsule. 



Hoary Plantain is intermediate in appearance between 

 Common Plantain and Ribgrass, and its seeds are intermediate 

 between those of Ribgrass and of Bracted Plantain. 



Bracted Plantain (Plantago aristata Michx.). A western 

 annual which is rather rare in Canada, although its seeds are 

 not uncommon in grass and clover seeds. The whole plant 

 is downy; leaves narrow, linear, grass-like; flower stalks erect, 



