"Weeds, as flowers, drop in the three classes of annuals, biennials and perennials. Any annual is easy enough to hold down. Just pull such weeds up. Some merely cut the weed off at the surface of the ground, but it is a better way to be rid of the thing entirely. And should you not be quite sure of the kind of weed, then pulling up is the only really safe plan. For if the weed happened to be a perennial, leaving the root in the ground would be the worst possible thing to do.
"The greatest business of all annuals is to form seed. Now I know you wish to say that this is the business of all plants. It is. But with annuals there is only one chance to produce seed. That chance is the one short year of their lives, and this is doubtless the reason why these chaps work so hard at seed forming, and produce so many seed. Therefore, the thing evidently to be done is to make it impossible for annuals to form seed.
"The biennials and perennials must have further treatment than just that of preventing seed formation. The underground part of such weeds must be destroyed. For these live in the ground ready to come up again. Biennials may be killed out by deep hoeing. Get rid of all the young plants, keep at the older ones with the hoe and prevent seed formation, too. Biennials are found most abundantly in waste places along woodsides and where the soil for a long time has been left undisturbed.
"Perennials need about the same treatment as biennials. But even greater persistency should be exercised in destroying the underground portion. For these underground plants produce new plants as surely as seeds do. The bindweed has a creeping root, wild garlic has a bulb, and such forms are always producing new forms underground while the seed above the ground is able to do the same thing.
"Ploughing helps destroy perennials, as the roots are exposed to direct sunlight and so destroyed. Another method of treatment is that of cutting off the top down to the root and putting salt on the freshly cut root tap. Then again these roots may be starved out by never allowing the top or leafy part to form. You will remember that it is the leaf which makes the food. And if there is no food then there will be none to store away in the root for new root formation. Some farmers smother roots. This is done by planting such crops as hemp, clover or cowpeas. These crops choke out the weeds. They cover the ground very completely, and so the weeds have less of a chance.
"I give the following table of a few very common weeds in order that you may know just how to handle them.
"I must speak especially about snapdragon or butter and eggs. It came to our country as a garden flower. It has spread and spread, partly by its seeds and partly by its root stalks, which are creeping ones, and now it is a perennial weed. For since it has become a nuisance it must be classed as a weed. As it spreads along it tends to force out other plants.
"This weed, like the wild carrot, is really very lovely. Could such weeds be properly held down in small garden areas they would be very ornamental. I saw a little flower garden once, quite beautiful, with two small clumps, one of wild mustard and one of field daisy, among the other flowers.
| COMMON NAME | CLASS | SEED TIME | COLOUR OF FLOWER |
| Burdock | Biennial | Aug.-Oct. | Purple |
| Bur-marigold or beggar ticks | Annual | July-Nov. | Yellow |
| Canada thistle | Perennial | " " | " |
| Chickweed | Annual | Mar.-July | White |
| Cocklebur | " | July-Oct. | Green |
| Dandelion | Perennial | May-Oct. | Yellow |
| English bindweed or morning glory | " | Aug.-Oct. | White |
| Moth Mullein | Biennial | July-Nov. | Yellow |
| Narrow-leaved stickseed or beggar tick | Annual | July-Oct. | Blue |
| Ox-eye daisy or white daisy | Perennial | Aug.-Oct. | White |
| Pigweed | Annual | Aug.-Nov. | Green |
| Prickly lettuce, milkweed | " | July-Nov. | Yellow |
| Purslane, pursley | " | June-Dec. | " |
| Rib-grass, plantain | Biennial | July-Nov. | White |
| Ragweed, Roman wormwood | Annual | Aug.-Nov. | Yellow |
| Russian thistle | " | " " | Purplish |
| Smartweed | Perennial | Aug.-Sept. | Pink |
| Sorrel | Perennial | June-Nov. | Red |
| Wild carrot, Queen Anne's lace | Biennial | July-Nov. | White |
| Wild garlic, onion | Perennial | July-Oct. | " |
| Wild mustard | Annual | June-Oct. | Yellow |
| Wild parsnip | Biennial | July-Oct. | " |
| Yellow daisy, ox-eye daisy, brown-eyed Susan | " | July-Sept. | " |
| Yellow dock | Perennial | Aug.-Oct. | Green |
"The seeds of the wild mustard, like those of the plantain and other weeds, get in with the grain seed and so cause constant trouble. Farmers feel that such weeds must be thoroughly gotten out of the fields.