Intro and Editors' Notes

Brian Duckwitz, Editor:

Although it has been awhile since the last issue of knotgrass (3.1), I think you will find the quality of our journal to be higher than ever. Not only do we have some great fiction, non-fiction and poetry, but some remarkable artwork as well. Knotgrass is improving with every issue, working to become the best e-journal on the net.

As is becoming standard here at knotgrass, our staff has yet again changed, while the format remains (mostly) the same. We are always accepting submissions and comments about our current issues; please feel free to drop us an electronic line and let us know what you think.

Knotgrass, Botanical: Polyganum aviculare (LINN.)
Family: N.O. Polygonaceae

---Synonyms---Knotgrass. Centinode. Ninety-knot. Nine-joints. Allseed. Bird's Tongue. Sparrow Tongue. Red Robin. Armstrong. Cowgrass. Hogweed. Pigweed. Pigrush. Swynel Grass. Swine's Grass.
---Part Used---Whole herb.
---Habitat---The entire globe.

The Knotgrass is abundant everywhere, a common weed in arable land, on waste ground and by the roadside.

The root is annual, branched and somewhat woody, taking strong hold of the earth; the stems, 1/2 to 6 feet in length, much branched, seldom erect, usually of straggling habit, often quite prostrate and widely spreading. The leaves, alternate and often stalkless, are variable, narrow, lanceshaped or oval, 1/2 to 1 1/2 inch long, issuing from the sheaths of the stipules or ochreae, which are membraneous, white, shining, torn, red at thebase and two-lobed. The flowers are minute, in clusters of two to three, in the axils of the stem, barely 1/8 in. long, usually pinkish, sometimes red, green, or dull whitish.

The plant varies greatly in size. When it grows singly in a favourable soil and clear of other vegetation, it will often cover a circle of a yard or more in diameter, the stems being almost prostrate on the ground and leaves broad and large; but when growing crowded by other plants the stalks become moreupright and all the parts are generally smaller.

The stems are smooth, with swollen joints, hence the common names, Nine-joints, Ninety-knots, etc., and when gathered it generally snaps at one of the joints.

It begins flowering in May and continues till September or October.

Some of the older herbals call it Bird's Tongue or Sparrow Tongue, these names arising from the shape of its little, pointed leaves. Its minute reddish flowers gained it the name of Red Robin. From the difficulty of pulling it up, it was called Armstrong, and from the fact that cattle and swine eat it readily, we find it called Cowgrass and Hogweed, Pigweed or Pigrush.

Keats, in "The Eve of St. Agnes":

A casement high and triple-arch'd there was,
All garlanded with carven imag'ries
Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass,
And diamonded with panes of quaint device.