Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 May 1894 — The Gopher Plant. [ARTICLE]

The Gopher Plant.

When travellers crossed the plains at the time when the Pacific railroads were first built, a beautiful plant called Euphorbia albo-margin-ata used to come up frequently along the railroad tracks, which the laborers believed to grow from seed that had been waiting there to sprout since the flood. They called it “Snow on the Mountain,” because the bracts under the flowers, such as we see in Poinsetta and other euphorbiaceous plants, were striped with white among the green. It is now stated in California circles that where this plant grows gophers will receive notice to quit. It is remarkable that it is said of another euphorbiaceous plant, the castor-oil plant, that where it is grown moles will never appear. No one has put great faith in this statement, but that two plants of the same family should be watched by two classes of observers, wholly independent of each other, and be reported to have exactly the same effect on destructive rodents, indicates that there must be something certain to bring about the like conclusions.—[St. Louis Globe-Demo-crat.