156 FARM WEEDS OF CANADA 



TRIBE ANTHEMIDEAE 



STINKING MAYWEED (Anthetnis Cotula L.) 



Other English names: Mayweed, Dog's Chamomile, Dog 

 Fennel. 



Other Latin name : Maruta Cotula DC. 



Introduced from Europe. Annual or winter annual. Dull 

 green, slightly hairy or hairless, with an acrid taste and a strong, 

 fetid odour. Stems 12 to 18 inches high, much branched from 

 the root up. Leaves finely dissected, twice or thrice pinnatifid. 

 Flower heads numerous, white, yellow-eyed, daisy-like, only 

 about 1 inch in diameter, supported by slender, naked footstalks, 

 forming a flat top bunch. Toward maturity the rays turn 

 abruptly downward. 



The seed (Plate 76, fig. 83) is small, about 1/16 of an inch 

 long, ovate-oblong or oblong, cut off straight at the upper end, 

 with a small knob in the centre, the smaller end abruptly pointed. 

 The surface roughened with tubercles arranged more or less 

 symmetrically in about 10 longitudinal rows; sometimes, how- 

 ever, the surface is nearly smooth. 



Time of flowering: Summer to autumn; seed ripe by July 

 and young plants sometimes abundant in September. 



Propagation : By seeds. 



Occurrence : A common weed in old settlements, around 

 buildings, along roads and in waste places, from the Atlantic 

 Coast to Manitoba, where it is rare as yet and found only along 

 railways but is rapidly appearing in new districts. 



Injury: An objectionable pest in fields and gardens; most 

 abundant where props have killed out in wet places. The seed 

 is a common impurity in grass and clover seeds. The dust from 

 Mayweed, ragweeds and others of this family, produced in 

 threshing grain, is irritating, if not poisonous. 



