Weed makes soft Carpet-like Lawn.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 146, 22 June 1931, Page 6

Weed makes soft Carpet-like Lawn.

Nature Notes

By

James Drummond,

F.L.S., F.Z.S.

LAWN of yarrow in Woolston is as soft as a thick carpet, greener than grass, easily cut and kept tidy, and in all respects satisfactory. In this way, a weed of the roadside, waste places, cultivated fields, paddocks, and sometimes gardens, is turned to use and ornament. Coming to New Zealand from the Old Country like scores of other weeds, the yarrow, according to Dr F. W. Ililgendorf,

is a serious pest in arable land, often growing so densely that it chokes out cereal and other crops. Its creeping-roots are twitchy, but it is difficult to eradicate by the ordinary methods of twitch cultivation. So brittle are its runners that they break into small pieces, which neither harrows nor grubbers bring to the surface. At starvation times, store sheep greedily eat the underground stems as they are exposed. This and summer cultivation are the only means Dr Ililgendorf suggests for reducing the yarrow. Markedly feathering leaves, soft and dark green, are the yarrow’s most obvious characteristics. When crushed, they are strongly aromatic. The flowers, on stems about two feet high, are small but occasionally pink or purply, and usually white, and grow in large fiat clusters. The yarrow’s relative, the sneeze-wort, whose leaves were used for snuff when snuff-boxes were in general use, has not been reported from New Zealand. The drawing is by Mr R. Veale, from Dr Hilgendorf’s “ Weeds of New Zealand.” (Messrs Whitcombe and Tombs.)