‘S 
COMPOSITAE (COMPOSITE FAMILY) 447 
The plant sends up in the first year only a clump of large leaves, 
long ovate, light green, the upper surface rough but the under 
surface downy-hairy, sometimes two feet in length and six or 
eight inches wide, with stout, hairy petioles. Fruiting stalks 
appear in the second year, three to six feet tall, stout, hairy, simple 
or sometimes branched, the leaves alternate, sessile and clasping. 
Heads terminal, solitary or few, two to four inches broad, on stout, 
hairy peduncles; rays yellow, numerous, linear, pistillate; disk- 
florets perfect and fertile; bracts of the involucre triple-rowed, the 
outer ones broad and leafy. Achenes brown, smooth, four-angled, 
with a pappus of bristly hairs. (Fig. 311.) 
Means of control 
Deep cutting with sharp spud or hoe, dry salt or carbolic acid 
being applied to the shorn root. 
COMPASS PLANT 
Stlphium laciniatum, L. 
Other English names: Pilotweed, Polar Plant, Turpentine Weed, 
Rosinweed. 
Native. Perennial. Propagates by seeds. 
Time of bloom: July to September. 
Seed-time: August to October. 
Range: Michigan to the Dakotas, southward to Alabama, Louisiana, 
and Texas. 
Habitat: Prairies; fields, meadows, and pastures. 
Many a traveler of the pioneer, roadless days of “going west” 
found this plant a very serviceable compass, for its large leaves 
are held nearly erect with their edges directed north and south. 
It is a vigorous, grossly feeding weed, with large, thick, deep- 
boring roots which yearly send up huge tufts of stout stems, four 
to twelve feet tall, bristly-rough, and sticky with resinous juices. 
Leaves alternate, a foot or more long, also bristly-rough on both 
sides, oblong, pinnately divided, the segments narrow, pointed, 
sometimes cut-lobed or pinnatifid, rarely entire; petioles long, 
rather stout, with dilated and clasping base. Heads three to five 
inches broad and very showy, sessile or with very short peduncle. 
