Stem: Smooth, much
branched, 1 to 2 ft. high, leafy, with unpleasant odor and acrid
taste. Leaves: Very finely dissected into slender segments.
Preferred Habitat - Roadsides, dry wasteland, sandy fields.
Flowering Season - June-November.
Distribution - Throughout North America, except in circumpolar
regions.
"Naturalized from Europe, and widely distributed as a weed in
Asia, Africa, and Australasia" (Britton and Brown's "Flora").
Little wonder the camomile encompasses the earth, for it imitates
the triumphant daisy, putting into practice those business
methods of the modern department store, by which the composite
horde have become the most successful strugglers for survival.
The unpleasant odor given forth by this bushy little plant repels
bees and other highly organized insects; not so flies, which, far
from objecting to a fetid smell, are rather attracted by it. They
visit the camomile in such numbers as to be the chief
fertilizers. As the development of bloom proceeds toward the
center, the disk becomes conical, to present the newly opened
florets, where a fly alighting on it must receive pollen, to be
transferred as he crawls and flies to another head.
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