The Democratic advocate., 1909-07-23
PAYS TO RAISE WEEDS.
These "Plants Out of Place" Have O
Fixed Market Value.

Money in weeds? To be sure. The
national department OF agriculture
has been for many years telling the
farmers Of the large money value 60
ing to waste each year in this country
in the shape of pernicfous weeds ana
has been issuing bulletins with d.
rectiona for collecting, curing and
selling the weeds. A quarter OF
century ago DR.. George B. Loring, the
commissioner of agriculture. called
attention to the fact that in Germany
many of the commonesr and most per-
nicious weeds that the American farm
er has to contend with were success
fully and profitab1y cultivated. Bur
dock, dandelion, witch grass, fox
glove, MULLEN, horehound, jimson,
mustard and water hemlock are
among our commonest weeds and
grow in great profusion almost every
where in the United States. Ordinar-
ily they are regarded merely as
troublesome weeds. The trouble, OF
course, is in the lazy habit OF attempt
ing to grow weeds and cultivated
crops on the same land at the same
time. So it often happens that the
witch grass between the potato rows
is more valuable than the tubers In
the hills. When you raise weeds you
must make a business of it.
Land that will raise nothing else
will raise weeds The jimson grows
| in rank profusion about the feed
| lot, the front yard is yellow with dan
delion flowers, and the flowers OF the
MULLEN bedeck the pastures. The bur-
dock grows in the roadside fence
corners, and the waste lot produces
an abundance of witch grass and COM
frey, yet a majority of the drug weeds
used in medicine in this country are
still imported and paid for at a high
rate.
Without counting wormwood, tansy
and rhubarb, all of which are weeds
in favored places, and without in
cluding catnip or pennyroyal or any
of the mints, the American people
are paying out more than 100000 a
4 year in hard earned money for i'm
ported weeds which are growing wild
in nearly every part of the country.
The knowledge that there is money
in the very common and much de-
spised weeds is spreading every year,
and a very considerable industry In
medicinal weeds has arisen, but it Is
for short of what it should be. The
average farmer cannot bring himself
to regard as other than a heresy the
declaration that a weed is simply
a useful plant out of place.
The price paid by big jobbing drug
houses for leaves, flowers or roots OF
the commoner weeds which af1tct the
farmer with their presence when he
lets them get out OF place are as fol-
lows: Dandelion roots, dried, jimson
weed, leaves and seeds, poison hem
lock, freshly plucked, and dried flow
ers and leaves and dried and cleaned
seed of black and white mustard, 5
cents a pound; burdock root, sliced
and dried, Z cents a pound; dried
leaves and blossoms of horehound
and wild foxglove, to Z cents a
pound; dried blossoms Of the tall pas
ture MULLEN, so = cents a pound If
sealed in tight jars. In addition to
the above standard drugs the dried
leaves of pokeweed and trillium, gold
thread and jack-in-the-pulpit are
marketed, as we'll as the leaves and
flowers of tansy, lobelia, boneset, cat
nip and dozen other very common
plants, all of which are in demand at
the market price.