WEEDS OP THE MILKWEED FAMILY. 105 



weed" and its tough fibrous inner bark is easily separated from 

 the straight stalks and is fine, long and quite strong. It is much 

 used by the Indians for making bags, mats, small baskets, belts 

 and twine for fishing-lines and nets. The milky juice is poisonous 

 and the numerous rootstocks and wind carried seeds render its 

 spreading easy. Remedies : hoe-cutting and salting ; thorough culti- 

 vation; repeated mowing. 



The spreading dogbane {A. androsa>mifolium L.) is a near rela- 

 tive and is also frequent in dry soil along thickets and fence-rows. 

 It is lower, 1-3 feet high, with more forking branches, wider leaves, 

 larger and more showy rose-colored flowers in which the corolla 

 tube is longer than the sepals. Remedies the same. 



The Milkweed Family.— A SCLEPIADACE^E. 



Herbs or vines with milky juice and mostly opposite or whorled 

 entire leaves. Flowers usually in umbels ; calyx 5-parted, the tube 

 very short or none ; petals 5, more or less united : between corolla 

 and stamens a crown of 5 hood-shaped nectar cups each contain- 

 ing an incurved horn; stamens 5, inserted on the base of the 

 corolla; pollen grains cohering to form a pear-shaped waxy mass, 

 two of which are united like little "saddle-bags" by a prolonga- 

 tion of their summits. (Fig. 11, i.) Fruit a follicle composed of 

 two valves, opening on the side. Seeds compressed and usually 

 bearing a tuft of long silken hairs. 



A large family whose main distribution is in the tropics. In 

 Indiana it is represented by 17 species, 11 of which are true milk- 

 weeds belonging to the genus Asclepias. They are perennial upright 

 herbs with thick, deep roots and having the simple umbels of mostly 

 purplish flowers borne on slender nodding stalks, which are either 

 terminal or springing from the axils of the leaves. When a bee 

 or other insect visits their flowers in search of honey its legs often 

 become entangled in the grooves between the hoods and in at- 

 tempting to escape a pair of the sticky pollen masses attach them- 

 selves to its feet. The bees and flies are often unable to free their 

 legs and are held prisoners until they die. Three of these milk- 

 weeds are with us common enough to be termed weeds. 



(')>. Asclevias Tur.EEOSA Tj. Butterfly-weed. Pleurisy-root. Wind-root 

 (P. X. 3.) 

 Stems erect, hairy, usually tufted, simple or branched near the top, 

 1-2 feet high, very leafy and with little milky juice; leaves alternate, 

 oblong or lanceolate, sessile or short-stalked, 2-6 inches long. Flowers 

 orange-yellow, showy, numerous. Pods hoary, erect on bent flower stalks. 

 Seeds flat, broadly winged with abundant silky hairs. 



