COMPOSITAE (COMPOSITE FAMILY) 531 
Means of control 
The rootstocks are shallow and horizontal in their growth, and 
plowing the rankly infested pasture or meadow kills them in ore 
season as they decay with the sod. Small areas may be removed by 
deep hoe-cutting. Flowering stalks should be cut in their first 
bloom, in order that none of the plumed achenes may be dispersed 
by the wind. 
BRISTLY OX-TONGUE 
Picris echoides, L. 
Other English names: Bugloss Picris, Bitter Bugloss. 
Introduced. Annual or biennial. Propagates by seeds. 
Time of bloom: July to September. 
Seed-time: August to October. 
Range: Locally distributed in Nova 
Scotia and Ontario and near the sea- 
ports of the Atlantic States; has 
reached as far inland as Ohio. 
Habitat: Fields, roadsides, and waste 
places. 
The achenes of this plant have been 
reported as an impurity in alfalfa seeds ; 
it is a very unpleasant weed, rejected 
by grazing animals because of its bitter 
juices and prickly-hairy foliage, and it 
should, if possible, be hindered from 
extending its range. 
Stems fifteen to thirty inches tall, 
branched, and closely set with stiff, 
prickly bristles. Lower and basal leaves 
large, spatulate, irregularly toothed, 
narrowed to margined petioles; stem- 
leaves much smaller, usually entire, 
sessile and clasping. Heads yellow, in 
spreading corymbose panicles, on short 
peduncles, each about a half-inch broad, 
the outer bracts of the involucre very 
large and leaf-like, prickly-hairy, the 
Fia. 367. — Bristly Ox- 
= tongue (Picris echoides). 
inner ones membranous, narrow and x}. 
