Figuring against Weeds. 775 
But all this aside; it is true that the State of Iowa has already 
more weeds than she wants for the purpose of premiums. Her 
good farmers get enough encouragement for being good without 
having their less prosperous neighbors loaded down with a heavy 
weight of thieving weeds. I for one would be willing to risk the 
quality of Iowa agriculture if every vile weed within our borders 
was rooted out and all their seeds burned to smoke and ashes. 
The conditions which surround our prairie farming, foster the 
growth of weeds. Land has been very cheap and at the same time 
very rich. The first fact has encouraged a spirit of carelessness on 
the part of the farmer and the second has permitted the rapid 
multiplication of rank weeds. Asa result our State is becoming 
almost overrun with plant-pests of both the field and the garden. 
The time has come when an earnest study must be made of the 
weeds which rob our land, already losing much of its virgin 
fertility. We must come to the rescue while the enemy is compara- 
tively weak. Education is more effective than legislation. It is 
not difficult, perhaps, to pass a law against cockle-bur, beggar’s 
lice, Canada thistle, ete., as has been done in many States, but an 
act of the legislature does little good until there is a keen apprecia- 
tion of the importance of clean fields and road sides, already in 
the minds of the farmers. 
With a view to becoming better acquainted with the weeds and 
useless plants of the State, a list has been prepared which embraces : 
(1) all the worst weeds, (2) the bad weeds, and (3) the indifferent 
weeds. The first class includes fifty-one (51). In the second 
group are ninety-four (94) kinds; and among the indifferent sorts 
are one hundred and fifty-two (152) species. This gives a total of 
two hundred and ninety-seven (297) distinct kinds of plants of no 
great usefulness to the farmers of the State, half of these a positive 
disadvantage and over half a hundred being pests of the worst sort. 
When thus arranged the enemy makes a long and bold front. 
If we look at these enemies in the light of their term of life—as 
the horseman would say, look in the mouth, it is found that eighty- 
four (84) are annuals ; twenty-seven (27) are able to live two years 
at the most, while one hundred and eighty-six (186) are perennial, 
that is, thrive for an indefinite term of years. ‘These figures can 
_ thrown into a tabulated form suitable for the blackboard, 
us :— 
