STUDIES OF PLANT LIFE 

 YELLOW COLTSFOOT Tussilayo Farfara (L.). 



A large proportion of our flowers of midsummer and 

 Autumn are of the Composite Order, but in the spring 

 they are rare, with a few exceptions such as the Early- 

 flowering Everlasting, the Fleabanes and the Coltsfoot. 



The first flower that blossoms is the Coltsfoot (Tussilago 

 Farfara L.), which breaks the ground in April with its 

 scaly leafless stem and single-headed orange-yellow rayed 

 flower. It is a coarse, uninteresting plant, not common 

 excepting in wet clayey soil; seldom found in the forest. 

 It is the earliest plant of the Canadian spring and prized 

 on that account and for its medicinal virtue, real or 

 imaginary. Both flower and leaf are larger than the 

 British species, but its habits are similar. 



In July, August and September our rayed flowers pre- 

 dominate, especially in the two latter months; it is then, 

 when the more delicate herbaceous flowers are perfecting 

 their seeds, that our hardy Sunflowers lift up their showy 

 heads and seem to court the glare of the summer sunshine; 

 it is then that we see our open fields gay with Eudbeckias, 

 Chrysanthemums, Ragworts, Goldenrods, Thistles and 

 Hawkweeds. In the forest we find our White Eupatoriums, 

 Prenanthes and Fireweeds. On all waste and neglected 

 spots the wild Chamomile abounds, as if to supply a tonic for 

 agues and intermittents. The beautiful Aster family may 

 now be seen in fields, by waysides, on lonely lake-shores, in 

 thickets, on the margins of pools and mill-dams, or waving 

 its graceful flowery branches on the grassy plains and 

 within the precincts of the forest. There are species for 

 each locality white, blue, purple, lilac, pearly-blue with 

 many varieties of shade, height and foliage; some species 

 graceful, bending, and spreading, others stiff, upright and 



114 



