Family: Teasel (Dipacaceae)

Spines packed between the minute lavender (white here) florets creeate a pincushion effect (an egg-shaped pincushion). Stems also armed with prickles. Dried flower heads persist on dead stems through winter. Leaves paired and carsley lobed, their bases forming a cup around the stem and may hold rain water.

NOTE: Well into this century, teasels were cultivated in Europe for their spiny flowerheads. The dried heads were mounted on rods and used by manufacturers of wollen goods to tease, or raies the nap of cloth. This ancient method was preferred over the use of metal divices because, when meeting a firm obstruction, the spines would break instead of tearing the material. Teasels, like many weeds, probably came to North America by accident, their seeds mixed with imported hay. (It may have been decades before enough land had been cleared in the New World to allow the colonists the luxury of pastures and hayfields.)

Height: 2 to 6 feet (sometime taller)

Found: fields, waste places and roadsides.

Blooms: July to August