Daily Yellowstone journal., 1886-12-25
PLANT ACCUMULATION.

Failure OF the watercress-The Thistle
in Austraiia-The sweetbriar.
Our failures in the acclimatization Of
vegetable life have almost always been
due to sentiment. The useful plants
and trees have, as a rule, fourished ad-
mirably. For example, Mr.. ]. A.
Froude states in his ~Oceana" that the
oats, barley, peas, beans and potatoes
were produced in such luxuriance in
Ballarat that he could believe Herodo-
tus' account of the crops grown on the
plains of Babylon. A reaplng machine
had stopped in a field of oats, the stems
of which stood up like a wall, and
seemed as il no horse could force
passage through them. For seventeen
successive years the ground had been
cropped and not particle of manure
had been put upon it. The strangest
point about it was that there were no
weeds, and Mr.. Froude offers the rather
bold suggestion that ~weeds are said to
be a product Of high civilization and do
not exist in nature"
Almost the only failure in useful plants
has been the watercress. Introduced
some years ago into New leland, it has
spread as rapidly as did the american
weed" in our own country, choking up
the rivers and involving the annual out
lay of many thousand pounds in keeping
the rivers sufficiently clear for navigable
purposes. Otago and Canterbury have
been severe sufferers from the water
cress. Sentiment, however, has always
been deadly foe to the colonist; for
example, some thirty years ago Scotch
emigrant to Australia took with him Q
thistle in a flower pot. Great were the
rejoicings among the Scotch colonists, q
dinner was given in in honor of the ma
tional plant, and it was then carefully
transferred to the soil Now it has
played the same part on land as the
watercress in the rivers, and has rem
dered whole tracts Of land useless. 1t
defies all attempts at extirpation and
great sums Of money are paid yearly in
restraining the once welcomed plant.
That the thistle would probably become
an injurious plant ought to have been
anticipated, and the very seeds should
have been prohibited as relentlessly as
we prohibit the Colorado beetle.
But who would have thought that the
sweetbriar could do any harm? At
home we are only too glad to have it in
our gardens, and sweetbriar hedge is a
thing of joy and an object of justifiable
pride. No one, therefore, would blamed
the missionary and his wife who took
with them plant Of sweetbriar as q
fragrant memorial of their garden in the
old country. But when set in the fresh
rich soil of Australia that plant grew
with almost savage fury. 1t drove great
roots into the ground, developed itself
from shrub into a tree, and spread
with such alarming rapidity that it is
quite as troublesome as the thistle.
Tasmania, which is to the mainland
Of Australia what the Isle of Wight is
to England, has suffered terribly from
the sweetbriar. New Zealand has Jared
no better. Mr.. Froude states that it is a
worse foe TO the agriculturist than the
native fern. AT home so chary Of
growth, it expands here into vast
bushes, becomes a weed and spreads
like weed. 1t overruns whole fields in
two or three seasons, will turn cleared
farm into an impenetrable thicket, and
has to be torn out with cart ropes and
teams of horses" The reason for this
astonishing growth of the thistle and
sweetbriar is the same as that which ac-
counts for the fecundity of the rabbit
and sparrow. The rich and fertile soil
affords the plants abundance of food,
and the native fora is SO feeble that the
sturdy intruders have no rivals to check
their progress. .-Longman's Magazine.