94 



POLYGONACEAE (BUCKWHEAT FAMILY} 



BROAD-LEAVED DOCK 

 Rumex obtusifolius, L. 



Other English names : Bitter Dock, Butter Dock, Blunt-leaved Dock. 



Introduced. Perennial. Propagates by seeds. 



Time of bloom : June to August. 



Seed-time: August to November. 



Range : Throughout the United States and southern British America. 



Habitat: Fields, meadows, pastures, and waste places. 



A large, very robust plant, in many localities, the most common 

 of the docks. Stem stout, erect, grooved, simple or with a few 

 branches, somewhat rough, especially near the top. Lower leaves 

 often more than a foot in length and half 

 as broad, oblong, with heart-shaped bases 

 and rounded or bluntly pointed tips, the 

 veins somewhat hairy on the under side ; 

 petioles long and thick; stem leaves nar- 

 rower and more pointed, all petioled. 

 Panicle large and loose, the whorls some- 

 what distant, often subtended by leafy 

 bracts ; pedicels slender, jointed below the 

 middle, longer than the calyx-lobes ; the 

 valves, which enclose the fruit, pointed- 

 ovate, or nearly halberd-shaped, strongly 

 net-veined, sharply toothed at the side, 

 and only one of them bearing a tubercle 

 on the back. Achene dark red, smooth 

 and shining, its three faces concave and 

 its angles faintly margined. 



Means of control the same as for Rumex 

 crispus. (Fig. 54.) 



TALL SORREL 

 Rumex Acetbsa, L. 



Other English names: Garden Sorrel, Sour 

 FIG. 54. Broad- Dock. 



leaved Dock (Rumex ob- Introduced. Perennial. Propagates by 

 tusifohus). x i seeds and by rootstocks. 



