168 FARM WEEDS OP CANADA 



FALL DANDELION (Leontodon autumnalis L.) 



Other English names: August Flower, Autumnal Hawkbit, 

 falsely called Arnica. 



Other Latin name : Apargia autumnalis Hoffm. 



Introduced from Europe. Perennial. Rootstock short and 

 thick, frequently divided into several heads, each of which 

 bears a thick tuft of toothed leaves, somewhat resembling those of 

 Common Dandelion, and several few-flowered, branched, leafless, 

 scaly stems. Flower heads over 1 inch across, bright yellow. 



The seed (Plate 76, fig. 92) is 1/4 inch long, brown, linear, 

 not beaked, ribbed lengthwise, marked with fine lines crosswise; 

 pappus dirty white, in 1 row of feathery bristles, about the 

 length of the seed itself. 



Time of flowering: July till frost; seeds ripe by August. 



Propagation : By seeds and by division of the crown. 



Occurrence: Abundant in the Maritime Provinces and 

 parts of Quebec. Recently reported from several places in 

 Ontario as occurring in hayfields. 



Injury: Spreads rapidly from seed and overruns meadows, 

 pastures and lawns, where it chokes out the grass. 



Remedy: Fields infested with this weed should be brought 

 under cultivation. It will not give trouble on lands worked 

 under a short rotation, such as cereal grains, clover and grass 

 for two years and hoed crops or peas for the fourth year, followed 

 again by cereal grain. Pasture lands that can not be cultivated 

 may be improved by severely raking the surface with a spring 

 tooth harrow and sowing the most vigorous grasses. It is freely 

 eaten by sheep when their favorite pasture grasses are short. 



ALLIED SPECIES: Ox-tongue (Picris echioides L.) is a 

 coarse, rough, bristly perennial with leafy branches, leaves and 

 bracts covered with small bristly spines, flowers yellow. The 

 seed, which occasionally occurs in grass and clover seeds, is 

 cylindrical, about 1/10 of an inch long, reddish brown, contracted 

 to a neck above, and transversely wrinkled. 



