CUCURBITACEAE (GOURD FAMILY) 405 
bright yellow, bell-shaped, three or four inches long and nearly as 
broad, deeply five-lobed with pointed and recurving tips, ridged, 
veined, and bearded inside and out; sterile flowers have three 
stamens, two of which have two-celled anthers, the other one- 
celled; fertile flowers have one pistil, with short, thick style and 
three-lobed stigmas. Ovary three celled, the fruit globose or 
broadly ovoid, about three inches in diameter, with a hard, smooth 
rind, yellow or pale green variegated with yellow, the pulp 
within fibrous and very bitter, the seeds numerous, oval, flattened, 
and lying horizontally in the triple cells. 
Means of control 
These troublesome plants are most readily and certainly de- 
stroyed by strong hot brine, caustic soda, or carbolic acid, applied 
to the crown of the huge, fleshy root. 
STAR CUCUMBER 
Sicyos anguldtus, L. 
Other English names: Nimble Kate, One-seeded Bur Cucumber. 
Native. Annual. Propagates by seeds. 
Time of bloom: July to September. 
Seed-time: August to October. : 
Range: Quebec to Minnesota, southward to Florida and Texas. 
Habitat: Moist, rich soil; banks of streams, fence rows, thickets, 
waste places. 
A vine of amazingly rapid growth; Dr. Coulter mentions one 
that climbed up a neighboring tree to a distance of sixty-three feet. 
Sometimes, on bottom lands which have been flooded, many seeds 
lie dormant until the ground is put under cultivation, when they 
suddenly spring to life, binding corn or tobacco rows or other vege- 
tation into tangled thickets. 
Stem pale green, slender but very tough and fibrous, angled, 
more or less viscidly hairy. Leaves very large (the lower ones 
sometimes ten inches across), alternate, thin, rough on both sides, 
heart-shaped at base, five-nerved and five-pointed, finely and 
sharply toothed, with rather short, hairy petioles ; opposite each leaf 
is a three- to five-parted and spirally curled tendril, on a much 
