Elkhart County, Indiana - Biographical sketches, 1881 (part 2 of 2)

Olive Family. - It would seem more natural to us Westerners to call this the Ash family, as we have no members of this order about us except the five species of ash, - white, black, blue, red and green, the white being the most common. Some of these kinds are difficult for the beginner in botany to distinguish.

Birthworts. - Wild ginger is common in deep, wooded ravines. The leaf is kidney-shaped, pjlant but few inches high, and the root tastes like ginger.

Ooosefoots. - Lamb's-quarters, or pigweed, a common weed in our gardens, is the type of this order. Beet and spinach are cultivated plants of this order. Next in abundance to lamb's-quarters are maple-leaved goosefoot, Jerusalem oak and Mexican tea. Wormseed is a fetid plant, belonging to the genus goosefoot. Orache is becoming abundant in the towns and cities. Bug-seed grows on the borders of the lakes.

Amaranths. - The cultivated coxcomb, globe amaranth and prince's feather (red, chaff'y spikes) illustrate the characters of this family. Pigweed is one of the most common weeds in cultivated gronud. The pigweed of the last paragraph sliould be called goosefoot only, or lamb's-quarters. White pigweed, generally known in the West as " tumble-weed," is abundant in some iields. Amarantns blitoides has recently become very abundant in our towns. At a little distance it resembles common purslane. Acaida tamariscina is common in sandy soil near the rivers and lakes.

Buokioheat Family or Knotiaeeds. - Goose-grass is the most ubiquitous member of this order, forming a carpet in every dooryard. A taller variety with wider leaves also abounds under the shade trees about the premises. Two species of smart-weed, mild water-pepper, water Persicaria and two other species of knotweed are all common. Out of 14 species of what appears to be smartweed, only two are biting to the taste. Arrow-leaved tear-thumb, black bindweed and climbing false buckwheat are common vines. Pie-plant, "yellow dock " and sheep-sorrel represent another division of the knotweed family. The most common member of this division in this county is curled, or " yellow " dock; then follow sheep-sorrel (abounding in sandy soil), pale, water, swamp and bitter docks.

Spurges. - Spotted spurge, an herb growing more prostrate than all others, on cultivated ground; milky; no visible flowers. Three other species of spurge are almost conjraon. Three-seeded mercury, known in former years to inhabit only the dark forest, has followed to our city residences where it can find a similar situation.

Nettle Order. - Of the Elm family are the white and the slippery elm and the hackberry, - the first mentioned abundant, the other two scarce. Of the Bread-fruit and Fig family is the red mulberry, which is scarce. Of the Nettle family proper are the true nettle (rare), wood nettle (common), richweed, pellitory, hemp and hop. Kichweed, or clearweed, like the mercury of the last paragraph, has followed man to his artificial groves and is very abundant on flat ground under heavy shade-trees, in some places. It is remarkable that botanists have placed in this order the osage orange tree of our hedges, the bread-fruit tree of the Pacific isles, the fig and the banyan, and the poison upas of the East Indies.

Walnut Family. - Black and white walnut (butternut) are well known. Three species of shell- bark and two of smooth-bark, are common in this country. The list comprises the shag-bark, the Western shell-bark, the mockernut or white-lieart, the pig-nut or broom, and the bitter-nut or swamp hickories.

Oah Family. - This family comprises not only the oaks but also the chestnut, beech, hazel-nut and iron-wood. Some of the oaks hybridize so much that it is diincult to keep track of the species and varieties. White oak, of course, takes the lead here as elsewhere, but the black jack is about as abundant. The latter is usually the " second growth," and is as good as hickory for firewood. Bur-oak, scarlet oak and black oak (yellow-barked, or quercitron) are common. Laurel or shingle oak, yellow chestnut oak and red oak are occasionally met with. Laurel oak is so called on account of the shape of its leaves, and is also called shingle oak, on account of its being so good in pioneer times for clapboards. Two species of iron-wood flourish here. They belong to different genera, one having seeds in clusters of involucres resembling hops; hence it is called hop Jiornbeam. The other iron-wood or hornbeam is also called blue or water beech.

Birch Family. - The red, or river birch is sometimes found along the rivers and creeks, the dwarf birch in swani]3S. Paper birch is rather common.

Willows. - The most common willow, as well as the largest, is the black; then the prarie, glaucous, heart-leaved, shining and longleaved. The black and the shining willows have tough twigs which are very brittle at the base. Several other species of willow occur, but are rare. The quaking asp, or American aspen, the cottonwood, balm-of-Gilead, Lombardy poplar and silver-leaf, or white poplar, are well known. Glandular-leaved willow is common about the head of Lake Michigan.

Arum Family. - Indian turnip (Jack-in-the pulpit) abundant; skunk cabbage common in wet places supplied by spring-water; green dragOTi common; sweet flag rare.

HVater-PlantaAn Fainily. - Arrowhead (two species, with several variations) is abundant. Has large, arrow-shaped leaves and white flowers in threes, and grows along the sloughs. Water plantain and arrow-grass are sometimes found, growing in same situation as last.

Orchids. - Showy orchis, eight or ten species of Habenaria, rattlesnake plantain, ladies' tresses, Pogonia, crane-fly orchis, adder's mouth, coral-root and five species of lady's slipper are found in this county, and Calopogon is common. The lady's slippers are

Amaryllis Family. - Star-grass is common in prairies. It is a modest little !>rass-like plant, putting forth its conspicious, yellow, three-petaled flowers in June.

Iris Family. - The larger blue flag is becoming rare. Blue-eyed grass looks like the star-grass just mentioned, except that the flowers are white or pale blue. Its habitat is the prairie.

Lily Family. - Purple trillium, or three-leaved nightshade, and the large white trillium are abundant: flower in May. One or two other species of trillium sometimes occur. Bellwort is an early flower in the woods. Smaller Solomon's seal and false spikenard are common. Wild orange-red lily is common in the margins of prairies which are not pastured and have never been broken. White dog's-tooth violet, white hellebore and great Solomon's seal o.ve reported here. Yellow dog's tooth violet is abundant; it is a prominent flower in April, in the woods. Squill (eastern quamash, or wild hyacinth) is also found in this county. Wild garlic, having tops like our garden top-onions, and wild leek are common in low places not pastured.

Rushes. - The bog-rush is a very common, yellowish, grass-like herb along roads and paths, especially those leading through the forest; but it is also found to some extent in all other situations. Coaunon, or soft rush is common, and several other species are also common.

Sedges. - There are three or four dozen species of sedge growing within the limits of any one county, but they are all unimportant plants. They have a grass-like appearance, but can readily be distinguished from the grasses by their having triangular stems and bur-like tops (seed clusters'), while the grasses have roundor roundish stems. What is generally called lake grass along the rivers is a true sedge, and its English name is great bulrush. It is by far the largest'of the sedges. The river club-rush is next in size.

Grasses. - Blue grass takes the lead for prevalence and utility. Next, two species of fox-tail. Besides these the most common grasses are white grass, rice cut grass, Indian rice or water oats, timothy, rush grass (two species), bent grass, wood reed-grass, dropseed (two genera); reed bent-grass, blue joint grass, porcupine grass, fresh-water cord-grass, Kcsleria, Eatonia (two species), melic grass, fowl meadow grass and its congener, Glyceria fluitans, low spear-grass, red top, Eragrostis (three species), fescue (two species), chess, Bromus ciliatus, reed (a tall, broom-corn-like grass growing in dense fields in the swamps of the river bottom), Hordeum pratense (a kind of wild barlej'), two species of Ijme-grass or wild rye, bottle-brush grass, reed canary grass, Paspalnm, wire grass, eight species of panic-grass, among them two kinds of tickle-grass, and one old-witch grass, crab-grass and barn-yard grass, sand-bur (in sand) and two species of beard-grass. About two dozen other kinds of grass can be found in the county, but they are all very rare.

Ferns. - Maiden-hair, brake, a spleenwort, a shield fern, a bladder fern, one species of flowering fern and the sensitive fern are commmon in the order here named, while two or three other ferns may be found.