248 



LEGUMINOSAE (PULSE FAMILY) 



The most widely distributed of the Vetches, being very common 

 in both Europe and Asia. Like nearly all of the Legume Family 

 it has root tubercles which cause it to enrich the soil where it 

 grows ; it furnishes good forage and good hay, but its tough, creep- 

 ing rootstocks make it so difficult of removal from places where it is 

 not wanted that it must often be rated as a bad weed. (Fig. 177.) 

 Stems tufted, slender, angled, 

 branching, two to four feet long, 

 climbing by means of tendrils at the 

 tips of the pinnately compound leaves 

 and forming dense mats, smothering 

 grass or other plants that grow be- 

 neath, and entangling and pulling 

 down the crop when growing in a 

 grain field. Leaves sessile or nearly 

 so, composed of eighteen to twenty- 

 four thin, narrowly oblong, entire 

 bristle-tipped leaflets. The whole 

 plant is covered with fine, close- 

 pressed hairs and is a soft olive green 

 in color. Flowers numerous, on 

 slender, one-sided axillary racemes 

 about as long as the leaves, the 

 standard and wings of the corollas 

 being narrower than in the preceding 

 species; each blossom is about a 

 half-inch long, violet-blue in color, 

 and hangs reflexed on its stalk. Pods 

 smooth, about an inch in length, and contain five to eight small, 

 dark brown, globular seeds. They are frequently an impurity of 

 grass and clover seeds and are somewhat troublesome to remove. 



Means of control 



In grain fields, very many of the seedlings that have not yet 

 begun to cling maybe raked out with a weeding harrow in the spring. 

 Infested meadows should be broken up and put to a well-tilled hoed 

 crop such as corn or potatoes, followed by oats and clover. In 

 places where cultivation is not desirable, the rootstocks must be 



FIG. 177. Cow 

 Cracca). 



(Vicia 



