Home › Contents › Black-Eyed Susan. Cone-Flower

Black-Eyed Susan. Cone-Flower

Rudbeckia hirta. Composite Family.

Stem.--Stout and hairy; one to two feet high. Leaves.--Rough and hairy; the upper long, narrow, set close to the stem; the lower broader, with leaf-stalks. Flower-heads.--Composed of both ray and disk-flowers; the former yellow; the latter brown and arranged on a cone-like receptacle. By the middle of July our dry meadows are merry with black-eyed Susans, which are laughing from every corner and keeping up a gay midsummer carnival in company with the yellow lilies and brilliant milkweeds. They seem to revel in the long days of blazing sunlight, and are veritable salamanders among the flowers. Although now so common in our eastern fields they were first brought to us with clover-seed from the West, and are not altogether acceptable guests, as they bid fair to add another anxiety to the already harassed life of the New England farmer.

Rudbeckia laciniata. Composite Family.

Two to seven feet high. Stem.--Smooth; branching. Leaves.--The lower divided into lobed leaflets; the upper irregularly three to five-parted. Flower-heads.--Yellow; rather large; composed of both ray and disk-flowers; the former drooping and yellow; the later dull greenish and arranged on a columnar receptacle.

This graceful, showy flower is even more decorative than the black-eyed Susan. Its drooping yellow rays are from one to two inches long. It may be found throughout the summer in the low thickets which border the swamps and meadows.