Sunflowers and Golden Rod. 



379 



longer, has more numerous flowers, and thus yields more 

 grain than the common variety. The Japan buckwheat is 

 said to be superior even to the silver leaf. 



The odd shrub, Hercules' club, Aralia spinosa, grown as 

 a curiosity North, but indigenous in Kentucky and Ten- 

 nessee, yields abundant nectar. It blooms at Lookout 

 Mountain early in August, just after the sourwood. 



Now come the numerous golden rods. The sjJecies of 



Aster, 



the genus Solidago (Fig. 182), in the Eastern United 

 States, number nearly two score, and occupy all kinds of 

 soils and are at home on upland, prairie and morass. These 

 abound in all parts of the United States. They yield 

 abundance of rich, golden honey, with flavor that is unsur- 

 passed by any other. Fortunate the apiarist who can boast 

 of a thicket of Solidagoes in his locality. 



The many plants usually styled sunflowers, because of 

 their resemblance to our cultivated plants of that name, 



