Even after dark and dull woodlands have undergone a drastic change and green growth is sprouting everywhere, spring cling puts a damper on the enjoyment of outdoor trails. The truth is no matter what time of year a hunter passes too, close to a bur patch she will likely bring home more wildlife than she intended too.
Turkey hunting is at it’s best this time of year. Hunters find themselves traveling great distances to set up and chase gobblers. Just one morning’s walk through wood and field can gather hundreds of unwanted bur souvenirs. The only thing worse than thorns that get stuck in your britches is a boot load of burrs on your clothing during a spring turkey hunt or any time for that matter. Nuisance weeds produce prickle-covered seeds that keep on living by attaching dormant hooked claws to anything that passes by.
Sticky burrs are rough, sharp, poky seeds produced by plants. They use to their advantage an outer surface of uneven, sometimes needle-like appendages, hooks or spines that adhere to most animal hair, clothing, and fabrics that they come into contact with. They generally grow in the summer and fall crops and along grassland and some open woodland area. They just hang around on stems until something or someone passes close enough to brush against the plant. That method of transplanting seeds can take new plants anywhere they happen to be discarded. Some burrs are small enough to be carried by the wind and some can even float on water. The purpose of a bur is disbursal of the seeds contained within.
According to the USDA one of the most widely spread noxious plants that produces burs is the Noogoora Bur Xanthium occidentale. It is also called by it’s more common name the cocklebur or rough cocklebur. It grows wild all across the United States. This oval-shaped bur is almost an inch long and it is covered with curved spines that are sharp enough to pierce the skin. They are noxious and can be poisonous to domestic stock in the early stage of growth. At that stage they will cause skin irritations in people as well.
Noogoora will die off each year and then re plant from discarded seeds. The Noogoora bur seed can take root in any season at any time if temperature and water fall are complimentary to its needs. Annuals are plants that must produce seed to germinate. The plants will die each winter and the seeds that are left behind on the dead stems or carried away to new locations will begin a new bur infestation. In the case of annuals the method of burn off will likely kill this years plants but the seeds that survive in the ground will just produce the following year.
In Missouri fields I have seen single cocklebur plants about two feet tall with more than 100 burrs growing on them. In the optimum conditions and climate plants can grow up to two meters tall with thousands of seed-covered bur capsules. The Australian government released a report siting that their climate is said to encourage that kind of growth. According to their reports cotton imports from Mississippi in late 1800's included the Noogoora bur. The name came because Noogoora is reported to be the place in Australia where growth of this noxious weed was first discovered. Because of the wide spread invasion of Noogoora bur it is now illegal to take this bur or plant into Australia.
The University of Missouri in Columbia has a helpful online Weed ID Guide for identification of other more common weeds that produce burs. More well known burs include the connected sections of Florida Beggerweed Desmodium tortuosum or individuals like Queen Ann’s Lace Daucus carota. These burs are much smaller and just as likely to cling to clothing. Most people are more familiar with these burs. There are many other types of lesser known burs. Some with long sharp appendages that can break off in the skin and some so small that it can take hours to pick them off of clothing by hand. Learning to recognize the more common forms of bur producing weeds and avoiding areas where they grow is the best way to keep them from attachment.
If at all possible try to remove unwanted burs from clothing and boots before you leave the area. A unique bur remover product like BurzOff can make light work of the tedious hand picking of each bur. The surfaces of this recycled "stone" product are varried. This general bur removal tool has a rounded edge as well as a flat surface. The course, fine and smooth sides are ideal for different clothing materials and comfort in the hand.
Burs should always be removed from clothing before it is washed and dried. When clothing that contains the large sharp burs is allowed to wash through the laundry there is always a chance of injury later. Even the smallest burs will damage delicate fabrics by causing thread picks and holes.
Burless clothing is available in several forms. Smooth non looped fabric products without clingy surfaces and original cowboy style leather chaps resist adherence from the smallest burs. One new fabric that has been designed with burless forethought for hunters is manufactured from GoreTex.
It seems that burs have influenced inventors and clothing manufacturers for many years. It is said that an encounter with clinging burs from burdock weed, spurred a Swiss engineer, Georges de Mestral, to look at a bur under his microscope and after seeing the long hooked bur appendages which attached to the thread loops of his clothes he used the design as a model for inventing Velcro.
