Wild-Flower Study 573 



Before a dandelion head opens, the stem, umess very short, is likely to 

 bend down to protect the young flowers, but the night before it is to bloom 

 it straightens up; after the blossoms have matured it may again bend 

 over, but straightens up when the seeds are to be cast off. 



It often requires an hour for a dandelion head to open in the morning 

 and it rarely stays open longer than five or six hours; it may require 

 another hour to close. Usually not more than half the flowers of the head 

 open the first day, and it may require several days for them all to blossom. 

 After they have all bloomed and retired into their green house and put up 

 the shutters, it may take them from one to two weeks to perfect their 

 seeds. 



In the life of the flower-head the involucre, or the house in which the 

 flower family lives, plays an important part. The involucral bracts, in 

 the row set next to the flowers, are sufficiently long to cover the unopened 

 flowers; the bracts near the stem are shorter and curl back, making a 

 frill. In the freshly opened flower-head, the buds at the middle all curve 

 slightly toward the center, each bud showing a blunt, five-lobed tip which 

 looks like the tips of five fingers held tightly together. The flowers in the 

 outer row blossom first, straightening back and pushing the banner out- 

 ward; and now we can see that the five lobes in the bud are the five 

 notches at the end of the banner. All the flowers in the dandelion-head 

 have banners, but those at the center, belonging to the younger flowers, 

 have shorter and darker yellow banners. After a banner is unfurled, 

 there pushes out from its tubular base a darker yellow anther-tube ; the 

 five filaments below the tube are visible with a lens. A little later, the 

 stigma-ramrod pushes forth from the tube, its fuzzy sides acting like a 

 brush to bring out all the pollen ; later it rises far above the anther-tube 

 and quirls back its stigma-lobes, as if every floret were making a dande- 

 lion curl of its own. The lens shows us, below the corolla, the seed. The 

 pappus is not set in a collar upon the dandelion seed, as it is in the aster 

 seed ; there is a short stem above the seed which is called the "beak" and 

 the pappus is attached to this. 



Every day more blossoms open ; but on dark, rainy days and during 

 the night the little green house puts up its shutters around the flower- 

 family, and if the bracts are not wide enough to cover the growing 

 family, the banners of the outer flowers have thick or brownish portions 

 along their lower sides which serve to calk the chinks. It is interesting to 

 watch the dandelion stars close as the night falls, and still more interesting 

 to watch the sleepy-heads awaken long after the sun is up in the morning; 

 they often do not open until eight o'clock. The dandelion flower-families 

 are very economical of their pollen and profuse nectar, and do not expose 

 them until the bees and other insects are abroad ready to make morning 

 calls. 



After all the florets of a dandelion family have blossomed, they retire 

 again into their green house and devote themselves to perfecting their 

 seeds. They may stay thus in retirement for several days, and during 

 this period the flower stem often grows industriously; and when the 

 shutters of the little green house are again let down, what a different 

 appearance has the dandelion family ! The seeds with their balloons are 

 set so as to make an exquisite, filmy globe; and now they are ready to 

 coquette with the wind and, one after another, all the balloons go sailing 

 off. One of these seeds is well worth careful observation through a lens. 



