Annual Report for 1908 of the Consulting Botanist. 313 
enough to enable them to spread to neighbouring plants. 
Growing plants attacked by dodder were exhibited in the 
Education Section of the Newcastle Show. The presence of 
dodder seeds in seed used for lays is obviously dangerous. The 
photographs reproduced above show the dodder on some of the 
experimental plants — Fig. 2, rye-grass where there is little 
growth and no real injury to the host plant ; Fig. 3, red clover 
which is being slowly killed by the parasite ; Fig. 4, kale on 
which it grows luxuriantly without any apparent injury to the 
host plant. 
The suggestion that seed containing dodder may safely be 
used in pasture is thus certainly misleading. The use of 
feady-made mixtures should be given up and the seeds should 
be separately bought and mixed by the farmer before sowing. 
Weeds. 
Among the common farm weeds sent for identification, 
and for information as to their properties and how to combat 
them, were specimens of eyebright ( Euphrasia officinalis 
Linn.). This small annual weed quickly spreads by the 
large number of seeds which it yearly produces before it 
dies. In the case under investigation the eyebright had 
come up in quantities all over the field. It is the more 
desirable to get rid of this weed, for it obtains part of its 
food from the useful plants in the pasture, and so far 
impoverishes them. Its roots seek for necessary food in 
the soil, and some attach themselves to the roots of other 
plants by suckers, which pierce the bark and thus withdraw 
food from the plant attacked. A number of plants, nearly 
related to the eyebright, in this way rob their neighbours 
of food which they had prepared for their own use. Louse- 
wort ( Pedicularis palustris Linn.) and yellow-rattle (Rhinan- 
thus Crista-Galli Linn.) have this characteristic. Yellow- 
rattle was figured and described in the Report for 1903. 
Though no case of serious 1 injury has been reported as caused 
by these plants, it is nevertheless important to note that 
eyebright and yellow-rattle sown by themselves, and thus 
prevented from attaching themselves to other plants, do not 
flourish, but die when they have consumed the food stored 
for them in the seeds. The eradication of weeds is often 
very difficult. It is not always practicable to bi’eak 
up a pasture and plough in the weeds deeply, though 
this would be the most efficient method if followed by a 
rotation of crops before the field was again laid down to 
grass. It is of course of the first importance in laying down 
that suitable seeds should be obtained, and that they should 
be free from weeds. 
