Most of the fields around us may have been reduced to stubble, but the wild plants at the field edges still stand tall. This once is not so much wild as feral – a domesticated species that has broken free. Oats were grown in this field last season, and seeds that dropped before harvest have grown. The so-called “recruits” that sprouted among this year’s wheat crop were killed off by spraying, but those at the field edge survived this cultural cleansing dropping seeds to continue the genetic line. More may appear next year, but over the course of a season or two the more vigorous and hardy truly wild grasses will take over, maybe interspersed by the offspring of this year’s wheat crop.
