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AMARANTHACEAE (AMARANTH FAMILY) 



SPINY AMARANTH 

 Amardnthus spinosus, L. 



Other English names: Prickly Careless Weed, Soldier Weed. 

 Introduced. Annual. Propagates by seeds. 

 Time of bloom: June to September. 

 Seed-time: Late July to November. 



Range: Massachusetts to Michigan, Illinois, and Kansas, south- 

 ward to the Gulf of Mexico. 

 Habitat: Cultivated ground, meadows, lawns, and waste places. 



A native of tropical America and a very common and troublesome 

 weed, particularly in the Southern States. Not known north of 

 Mason and Dixon's Line until after the Civil War, when it suddenly 

 appeared in many places most probably transported in the feed- 

 bags of returning cavalrymen, which is 

 the reason why it is called Soldier 

 Weed, not because of its own weapons. 

 Stem one to four feet tall, stout, 

 grooved, erect, smooth, branching and 

 bushy, dark green or often purplish 

 red. Leaves one to three inches long, 

 broadly lance-shaped, pointed at both 

 ends, the lower ones with long petioles ; 

 at the base of each leaf is a pair of 

 diverging stipular spines, one-fourth to 

 one-half inch long, rigid, keen as awls. 

 Flowers small, greenish, the upper ones 

 mostly staminate, forming long, slender 

 spikes ; fertile ones below in the axils, 

 the clusters usually nearly globular; 

 bracts awl-like, about as long as the 

 scarious, sharp-pointed sepals ; stamens 

 five. Seed very small, lens-shaped, 

 smooth, dark, shining brown, imper- 

 fectly covered by the utricle ; it is too 

 often an impurity of other seeds, 

 and, like all its family, is possessed 

 Fro. 77. spiny Amaranth of long vitality in the soil. (Fig. 

 (Amaranthus spinosus). X J. 77.) 



