CHENOPODIACEAE (OOOSEFOOT FAMILY) 119 



Means of control 



Sow clean seed. Prevent the production of seed. When the 

 weed is cut close to the ground before seeding, it dies. Young 

 seedlings, six or eight inches high, may be plowed under, a drag- 

 chain being used to help pull them beneath the turning furrow. 

 On such land, plowed as late as July, a soiling crop of corn or rape 

 may be grown. In such cultivated crops as potatoes, corn, and 

 beets, tillage should be continued later than is customary. In 

 grain fields, particularly those harvested with a header, the stubbles 

 should be burned over, first being mowed and dried for a few days 

 if the weeds are still green. Entire communities should be con- 

 cerned in keeping highways, firebreaks, and all waste land clean of 

 the pest. 



RUSSIAN PIGWEED 



Axyris amarantoldes, L. 



Introduced. Annual. Propagates by seeds. 

 Time of bloom : June to July. 

 Seed-time: July to August. 

 Range: Manitoba, Minnesota, and the Dakotas. 

 Habitat: Grain fields, meadows, railway embankments, roadsides, 

 and waste places. 



A native of Siberia, first appearing in this country in 1886, in 

 Canada near Winnipeg, Manitoba ; since when the plant has 

 spread very rapidly, east, west, and south. It is a coarse, deeply 

 rooted, grossly feeding weed, two to four feet in height, widely 

 branched and very leafy, seriously crowding the crops among 

 which it grows. When young, it somewhat resembles Lamb's 

 Quarters, but, instead of being mealy, the branches and under 

 side of the leaves are clothed with very short, star-shaped 

 hairs. (Fig. 73.) 



Stem rather stout, grooved, light-colored, very hard and woody 

 when mature, and injurious to harvesting machines. Leaves 

 alternate, lance-shaped, with short petioles, sparsely toothed or 

 wavy-edged, the upper ones entire. Flowers of two kinds, at first 

 green and inconspicuous, the staminate ones in slender spikes, 

 terminating the many branchlets ; the fertile flowers below, thickly 



