Category Archives: Wildflowers – Spring

California Poppy

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As I travel through the northern part of the state, the hills are alive with the vibrant colors of wildflowers. The California Poppy was designated the state flower in 1903.

Early Spanish explorers called this flower copa de oro – meaning “cup of gold.” California Indians valued the poppy as a food source and for the oil extracted from the plant. The Golden State celebrates it by having California Poppy Day every April 6.

This is a small plant, with one flower per slender stem. A mature plant may be as short as two inches, yet the hardy seeds can spread far and wide and take root in sandy, difficult soil where other plants’ seeds may fail.

The California Poppy is the most well known flower in the state and even schoolchildren are taught to recognize it. The satiny 1-3 inch wide petals form a shallow cup-shaped flower that is vivid golden orange in color.

The flowers bloom on plants with have bluish-green parsley-shaped leaves, usually wider than they are tall. The flowers can be seen from February to September.

At the base of the flower is a distinctive expanded rim which looks like a circle. This allows for easy identification if this plant at times when it is not in bloom.

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Skunk Cabbage Melting Ice

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Skunk Cabbage brings a whole new meaning to the words “power plant.” This ice was thick enough for me to walk on today, yet these spikes had pushed right through it. This plant’s ability to generate heat enables it to grow and flower while snow is still on the ground – even though the plant is not frost-resistant – because frost never touches it.

There are only a few thermogenic (heat generating) plants in the world and in late Winter Skunk Cabbage can produce enough heat to stay between 60 and 95 degrees above the air temperature.

Instead of producing a colorful flower to attract insects, cold-tolerant bees and flies are drawn to the plant’s carcass-like smell. Heat causes the smell to travel farther than normal and once they arrive, pollinating insects have a place to warm up.

That purplish spike serves as a bud that holds and protects the flower when it emerges out of the ground.

To me, Skunk Cabbage is the first sign of Spring around here, so seeing this unique, yet smelly plant is a welcome sight.

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Mayapple

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Hiking through North Chagrin Reservation in March, I noticed this twisting up through the forest floor. It’s a Mayapple -  Mayapple is a perennial native herb found growing in moist soils in rich woods, thickets and pastures in eastern North America.

By April the umbrella-like plants were really starting to grow. They can get to 18 inches tall. Two large, dark green, palmate leaves grow to protect the large white flower. The leaves can get to be 12 inches across.

In May I saw a few Mayapples beginning to bloom in central Ohio. Mayapple flowers turn into crab apple-sized edible fruit.  The fully ripe fruit is eaten raw, cooked or made into jams, jellies, marmalade and pies.

By June I plucked a couple of Mayapples to try out. It is best to wait until the fruit turns yellow before eating. It has a sweet, peculiar, but agreeable flavor. May apples are just one of the many delicious (and often overlooked) ways of celebrating Summer.

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White Prickly Poppy

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I saw a few of these in Arizona today. A member of the poppy family, it has flowers that grow to 3 inches across with numerous yellow stamens.

One researcher noted that the leaves of the white prickly poppy are so prickly that cattle will not even eat it during severe drought periods.

The seeds of the white prickly poppy are said to be an excellent source of food for quail and other birds because of their high oil content. Additionally, the oil from this plant was used as an alternative fine lubricant during World War II.

Records of its use date as far back as the Aztecs, when their priests would use the plant in their sacrifice rituals. The Comanche’s so revered the plant for its many uses that they made offerings to it during harvesting.

This particular plant was being visited by young katydids.

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Northern Blue Flag Iris

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I’ve been seeing a fair amount of this graceful, sword-leaved plant with three showy, downward-curved, violet, boldly veined petal-like sepals.

This is a native iris of northeastern wetlands. Insects attracted to its sepals facilitate the plant’s pollination.

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Northern Blue Flag Iris can be seen in marshes, swamps, wet meadows, along shorelines, and in forested wetlands. It grows to be about three feet tall.

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Its rootstalks have long been used in herbal medicine to treat a variety of ailments.

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Skunk Cabbage

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The first thing you notice about Skunk Cabbage is how surprisingly big it is. Walking through the forest and coming across this large, leafy plant makes quite an impression. It is easy to recognize, with its huge leaves rising directly from the ground.

Skunk Cabbage is a low growing, foul smelling plant that prefers wetlands. It flowers early in the spring when only the flowers are visible above the mud. The stems remain buried below the surface of the soil with the leaves emerging later.

Breaking or tearing a nearly two foot long leaf produces a pungent odor, which is the source of the plant’s common name. The foul odor attracts pollinators and may also discourage large animals from disturbing or damaging the plant.

Many fly species, as well as some butterflies, bees and beetles pollinate Skunk Cabbage. In the fall, Skunk Cabbage leaves fall over and begin to rot. Small animals, including slugs, millipedes, and pillbugs eat the old leaves, but Skunk Cabbage leaves are poisonous to mammals (including us). The large fallen leaves also provide shelter for small animals.

In late winter and early spring, Skunk Cabbage has a remarkable ability to produce heat that allows it to emerge and bloom even when the ground is still frozen. When temperatures are freezing, the flower buds can warm up to 70 degrees, which melts the snow around the plant. The flowers are characterized by a mottled maroon hood-like structure.

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Bloodroot

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This delicate wildflower is one of the plants that ushers in spring in late winter and then fades quietly away as the heat of summer arrives. Bloodroot is aptly named. When the root is cut, the stem exudes a red sap that looks just like blood. In addition to having a single, white flower – each plant has only one leaf.

Research has reported that Bloodroot contains some very interesting and important chemical substances, like sanguinarine, which has anesthetic properties.

Research has also confirmed that the Bloodroot plant contains chemical substances that help Bloodroot to work effectively as an antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant, and antiseptic agent.

Many cultures have used this plant’s red juice as a dye and as insect repellent.

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Coltsfoot

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Walking through the brown, still getting ready for spring woods, it’s hard not to notice a vibrant, yellow wildflower that looks very much like a dandelion. Though it has many common names, I was taught this plant as being Coltsfoot.

It is often found in colonies of dozens of plants. The flowers appear in early spring before dandelions appear. The leaves, which resemble a colt’s foot in cross section, do not appear usually until after the seeds are set. So the flowers often appear on stems with no apparent leaves, and the later-appearing leaves then wither and die during the season without flowers.

Coltsfoot is not native to the United States, but it has been here a long time. It was most likely brought here by settlers as a medicinal item. Coltsfoot has been used in herbal medicine for its purported cough-suppressing effects. The plant has been used historically to treat lung ailments such as asthma as well as various coughs.

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Its Latin name is Tussilago farfara; “tussilago” itself means “cough suppressant.” It was so popular in Europe at one time that French pharmacists painted its flowers on their doorposts.

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