116 HARPER 



Summary. The commonest weeds are Helenium, Acantho- 

 spermm, Diodia teres, Stenophyllus Floridanus, Lespedeza striata, 

 Eragrostis simplex, Euphorbia maculata, and Syntherisma, 

 approximately in the order named. Three of these, Helenium, 

 Acanthospermum, and Lespedeza, are known to have come into 

 Georgia since the recollection of some of the older inhabitants, 

 one from the west, one from tropical America, and one from 

 Asia. 1 Two others, Stenophyllus and Eragrostis, are definitely 

 known only from Georgia and Florida, and have been described 

 only within the last ten or twelve years, but they can hardly 

 be native in this country. The other three, Diodia, Euphorbia, 

 and Syntherisma, are so common in the Eastern United States 

 that they are qften considered indigenous. Most of the other 

 weeds in the whole list have been noted but once or twice in our 

 territory. 



Compositas and Gramineae are the largest families in the above 

 list, but a larger proportion (100%) of our Ambrosiaceae and 

 Solanaceae, and several families represented by a single species 

 each, are weeds. Solanum and Eragrostis are the largest genera 

 in the list, and it is noteworthy that they have no native 

 representatives in our territory. 



As for the ranges of these weeds, quite a number are not known 

 outside of North America, but it is difficult to imagine what their 

 habitats could have been before the country was settled. (This 

 class of supposed native weeds is doubtless much larger in almost 

 all other parts of the country.) In such cases one is almost 

 forced to the conclusion that the species have originated (by 

 mutation or otherwise) since the discovery of America. Of 

 those whose origin is known the majority came from the tropics, 

 but some of them are probably just as much weeds there as here. 

 Several are probably natives of the western plains and prairies, 

 and a few came from Europe with the early settlers. 2 



J Dr. H. A. Mettauer, the veteran botanist of Macon, tells me that he 

 can remember when Lespedeza striata first appeared there, and that it 

 came in the shape of packing around some Chinese or Japanese crockery. 



2 Compare this list of weeds with one for Sumter County in Bull. Torrey 

 Club 27: 421. 1900. 



