"If blue is the favorite color of bees, and if bees have so much
to do with the origin of flowers, how is it that there are so few
blue ones? I believe the explanation to be that all blue flowers
have descended from ancestors in which the flowers were green;
or, to speak more precisely, in which the leaves surrounding the
stamens and pistil were green; and that they have passed through
stages of white or yellow, and generally red, before becoming
blue." - Sir John Lubbock in "Ants, Bees, and Wasps."
VIRGINIA or COMMON DAY-FLOWER
(Commelina Virginica) Spiderwort family
Flowers - Blue, 1 in. broad or less, irregular, grouped at end of
stem, and upheld by long leaf-like bracts. Calyx of 3 unequal
sepals; 3 petals, 1 inconspicuous, 2 showy, rounded. Perfect
stamens 3; the anther of 1 incurved stamen largest; 3
insignificant and sterile stamens; 1 pistil. Stem: Fleshy,
smooth, branched, mucilaginous. Leaves: Lance-shaped, 3 to 5 in.
long, sheathing the stem at base; upper leaves in a spathe-like
bract folding like a hood about flowers. Fruit: A 3-celled
capsule, seed in each cell.
Preferred Habitat - Moist, shady ground.
Flowering Season - June - September.
Distribution - Southern New York to Illinois and Michigan,
Nebraska, Texas, and through tropical America to Paraguay. -
Britton and Browne.
Delightful Linnaeus, who dearly loved his little joke, himself
confesses to have named the day-flowers after three brothers
Commelyn, Dutch botanists, because two of them - commemorated in
the two showy blue petals of the blossom - published their works;
the third, lacking application and ambition, amounted to nothing,
like the inconspicuous whitish third petal! Happily Kaspar
Commelyn died in 1731, before the joke was perpetrated in
"Species Plantarum."
In the morning we find the day-flower open and alert-looking,
owing to the sharp, erect bracts that give it support; after
noon, or as soon as it has been fertilized by the female bees,
that are its chief benefactors while collecting its abundant
pollen, the lovely petals roll up, never to open again, and
quickly wilt into a wet, shapeless mass, which, if we touch it,
leaves a sticky blue fluid on our finger-tips.
The SLENDER DAY-FLOWER (C. erecta), the next of kin, a more
fragile-looking, smaller-flowered, and narrower-leafed species,
blooms from August to October, from Pennsylvania southward to
tropical America and westward to Texas.
SPIDERWORT; WIDOW'S or JOB'S TEARS
(Tradescantia Virginiana) Spiderwort family
Flowers - Purplish blue, rarely white, showy, ephemeral, 1 to 2
in. broad; usually several flowers, but more drooping buds,
clustered and seated between long blade-like bracts at end of
stern. Calyx of 3 sepals, much longer than capsule. Corolla of 3
regular petals; 6 fertile stamens, bearded; anthers orange; 1
pistil. Stem: 8 in. to 3 ft. tall, fleshy, erect, mucilaginous,
leafy. Leaves: Opposite, long, blade-like, keeled, clasping, or
sheathing stem at base. Fruit: 3-celled capsule.
Preferred Habitat - Rich, moist woods, thickets, gardens.
Flowering Season - May-August.
Distribution - New York and Virginia westward to South Dakota and
Arkansas.
As so very many of our blue flowers are merely naturalized
immigrants from Europe, it is well to know we have sent to
England at least one native that was considered fit to adorn the
grounds of Hampton Court. John Tradescant, gardener to Charles I,
for whom the plant and its kin were named, had seeds sent him by
a relative in the Virginia colony; and before long the deep azure
blossoms with their golden anthers were seen in gardens on both
sides of the Atlantic - another one of the many instances where
the possibilities of our wild flowers under cultivation had to be
first pointed out to us by Europeans.
Like its relative the dayflower, the spiderwort opens for part of
a day only. In the morning it is wide awake and pert; early in
the afternoon its petals have begun to retreat within the calyx,
until presently they become "dissolved in tears," like Job or the
traditional widow. What was flower only a few hours ago is now a
fluid jelly that trickles at the touch. Tomorrow fresh buds will
open, and a continuous succession of bloom may be relied upon for
a long season. Since its stigma is widely separated from the
anthers and surpasses them, it is probable the flower cannot
fertilize itself, but is wholly dependent on the female bees and
other insects that come to it for pollen. Note the hairs on the
stamens provided as footholds for the bees.
The plant is a cousin of the "Wandering Jew" (T. repens), so
commonly grown either in water or earth in American
sitting-rooms. In a shady lane within New York city limits, where
a few stems were thrown out one spring about five years ago, the
entire bank is now covered with the vine, that has rooted by its
hairy joints, and, in spite of frosts and blizzards, continues to
bear its true-blue flowers throughout the summer.
PICKEREL WEED
(Pontederia cordata) Pickerel-weed family
Flowers - Bright purplish blue, including filaments, anthers, and
style; crowded in a dense spike; quickly fading; unpleasantly
odorous. Perianth tubular, 2-lipped, parted into 6 irregular
lobes, free from ovary; middle lobe of upper lip with 2 yellow
spots at base within. Stamens 6, placed at unequal distances on
tube, 3 opposite each lip. Pistil 1, the stigma minutely toothed.
Stem: Erect, stout, fleshy, to 4 ft. tall, not often over 2 ft.
above water line. Leaves: Several bract-like, sheathing stem at
base; leaf only, midway on flower-stalk, thick, polished,
triangular, or arrow-shaped, 4 to 8 in. long, 2 to 6 in. across
base.
Preferred Habitat - Shallow water of ponds and streams.
Flowering Season - June-October.
Distribution - Eastern half of United States and Canada.
Grace of habit and the bright beauty of its long blue spikes of
ragged flowers above rich, glossy leaves give a charm to this
vigorous wader. Backwoodsmen will tell you that pickerels lay
their eggs among the leaves; but so they do among the sedges,
arums, wild rice, and various aquatic plants, like many another
fish. Bees and flies, that congregate about the blossoms to feed,
may sometimes fly too low, and so give a plausible reason for the
pickerel's choice of haunt. Each blossom lasts but a single day;
the upper portion, withering, leaves the base of the perianth to
harden about the ovary and protect the solitary seed. But as the
gradually lengthened spike keeps up an uninterrupted succession
of bloom for months, more than ample provision is made for the
perpetuation of the race - a necessity to any plant that refuses
to thrive unless it stands in water. Ponds and streams have an
unpleasant habit of drying up in summer, and often the pickerel
weed looks as brown as a bulrush where it is stranded in the
baked mud in August. When seed falls on such ground, if indeed it
germinates at all, the young plant naturally withers away.
In the Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club, Mr. W. H. Leggett,
who made a careful study of the flower, tells that three forms
occur, not on the same, but on different plants, being even more
distinctly trimorphic than the purple Loosestrife. As these
flowers set no seed without insects' aid, the provisions made to
secure the greatest benefit from their visits are marvelous. Of
the three kinds of blossoms, one raises its stigma on a long
style reaching to the top of the flower; a second form lifts its
stigma only halfway up, and the third keeps its stigma in the
bottom of the tube. Now, there are two sets of stamens, three in
each set bearing pollen grains of different size and value.
Whenever the stigma is high, the two sets of stamens keep out of
its way by occupying the lowest and middle positions, or just
where the stigmas occur in the two other forms; or, let us say,
whenever the stigma is in one of the three positions, the
different sets of stamens occupy the other two. In a long series
of experiments on flowers occurring in two and three forms -
dimorphic and trimorphic - Darwin proved that perfect fertility
can be obtained only when the stigma in each form is pollenized
with grains carried from the stamens of a corresponding height.
For example, a bee on entering the flower must get his abdomen
dusted with pollen from the long stamens, his chest covered from
the middle-length stamens, and his tongue and chin from the set
in the bottom of the tube nearest the nectary. When he flies off
to visit another flower, these parts of his body coming in
contact with the stigmas that occupy precisely the position where
the stamens were in other individuals, he necessarily brushes off
each lot of pollen just where it will do the most good. Pollen
brought from high stamens, for example, to a low stigma, even
should it reach it, which is scarcely likely, takes little or no
effect. Thus cross-fertilization is absolutely essential, and in
three-formed flowers there are two chances to one of securing it.
WILD HYACINTH, SCILLA or SQUILL. QUAMASH
(Quamasia kyacinthina; Scilla Fraseri of Gray) Lily family
Flowers - Several or many, pale violet blue, or rarely white, in
a long, loose raceme; perianth of 6 equal, narrowly oblong,
widely spreading divisions, the thread-like filaments inserted at
their bases; style thread-like, with 3-lobed stigma. Scape: 1 to
2 ft. high, from egg-shaped, nearly black bulb, 1 to 1 1/2 in.
long. Leaves: Grass-like, shorter than flowering scape, from the
base. Fruit: A 3-angled, oval capsule containing shining black
seeds.
Preferred Habitat - Meadows, prairies, and along banks of
streams.
Flowering Season - April-May.
Distribution - Pennsylvania and Ohio westward to Minnesota, south
to Alabama and Texas.
Coming with the crocuses, before the snow is off the ground, and
remaining long after their regal gold and purple chalices have
withered, the Siberian scillas sold by seedsmen here deserve a
place in every garden, for their porcelain-blue color is rare as
it is charming; the early date when they bloom makes them
especially welcome; and, once planted and left undisturbed, the
bulbs increase rapidly, without injury from overcrowding.
Evidently they need little encouragement to run wild.
Nevertheless they are not wild scillas, however commonly they may
be miscalled so. Certainly ladies' tresses, known as wild
hyacinth in parts of New England, has even less right to the
name.
Our true native wild hyacinth, or scilla, is quite a different
flower, not so pure a blue as the Siberian scilla, and paler; yet
in the middle West, where it abounds, there are few lovelier
sights in spring than a colony of these blossoms directed
obliquely upward from slender, swaying scapes among the lush
grass. Their upward slant brings the stigma in immediate contact
with an incoming visitor's pollen-laden body. As the stamens
diverge with the spreading of the divisions of the perianth, to
which they are attached, the stigma receives pollen brought from
another flower, before the visitor dusts himself anew in
searching for refreshment, thus effecting cross-pollination.
Ants, bees, wasps, flies, butterflies, and beetles may be seen
about the wild hyacinth, which is obviously best adapted to the
bees. The smallest insects that visit it may possibly defeat
Nature's plan and obtain nectar without fertilizing the flower,
owing to the wide passage between stamens and stigma. In about an
hour, one May morning, Professor Charles Robertson captured over
six hundred insects, representing thirty-eight distinct species,
on a patch of wild hyacinths in Illinois.
The bulb of a MEDITERRANEAN SCILLA (S. maritima) furnishes the
sourish-sweet syrup of squills used in medicine for bronchial
troubles.
The GRAPE HYACINTH (Muscari botrycides), also known as Baby's
Breath, because of its delicate faint fragrance, escapes from
gardens at slight encouragement to grow wild in the roadsides and
meadows from Massachusetts to Virginia and westward to Ohio. Its
tiny, deep-blue, globular flowers, stiffly set around a fleshy
scape that rises between erect, blade-like, channeled leaves,
appear spring after spring wherever the small bulbs have been
planted. On the east end of Long Island there are certain meadows
literally blued with the little runaways.
PURPLE TRILLIUM, ILL-SCENTED WAKE-ROBIN or BIRTH-ROOT
(Trillium erectum) Lily-of-the-Valley family
Flowers - Solitary, dark, dull purple, or purplish red; rarely
greenish, white, or pinkish; on erect or slightly inclined
footstalk. Calyx of 3 spreading sepals, 1 to 1 1/2 in. long, or
about length of 3 pointed, oval petals; stamens 6; anthers longer
than filaments; pistil spreading into 3 short, recurved stigmas.
Stem: Stout, 8 to i6 in. high, from tuber-like rootstock. Leaves:
In a whorl of 3; broadly ovate, abruptly pointed, netted-veined.
Fruit: A 6-angled, ovate, reddish berry.
Preferred Habitat - Rich, moist woods.
Flowering Season - April-June.
Distribution - Nova Scotia westward to Manitoba, southward to
North Carolina and Missouri.
Some weeks after the jubilant, alert robins have returned from
the South, the purple trillium unfurls its unattractive,
carrion-scented flower. In the variable colors found in different
regions, one can almost trace its evolution from green, white,
and red to purple, which, we are told, is the course all flowers
must follow to attain to blue. The white and pink forms, however
attractive to the eye, are never more agreeable to the nose than
the reddish-purple ones. Bees and butterflies, with delicate
appreciation of color and fragrance, let the blossom alone, since
it secretes no nectar; and one would naturally infer either that
it can fertilize itself without insect aid - a theory which
closer study of its organs goes far to disprove - or that the
carrion-scent, so repellent to us, is in itself an attraction to
certain insects needful for cross-pollination. Which are they?
Beetles have been observed crawling over the flower, but without
effecting any methodical result. One inclines to accept Mr.
Clarence M. Weed's theory of special adaptation to the common
green flesh-flies (Lucilia carnicina), which would naturally be
attracted to a flower resembling in color and odor a raw
beefsteak of uncertain age. These little creatures, seen in every
butcher shop throughout the summer, the flower furnishes with a
free lunch of pollen in consideration of the transportation of a
few grains to another blossom. Absence of the usual floral
attractions gives, the carrion flies a practical monopoly of the
pollen food, which no doubt tastes as it smells.
The SESSILE-FLOWERED WAKE-ROBIN (T. sessile), whose dark purple,
purplish-red, or greenish blossom, narrower of sepal and petals
than the preceding, is seated in a whorl of three egg-shaped,
sometimes blotched, leaves, possesses a rather pleasant odor;
nevertheless it seems. to have no great attraction for insects.
The stigmas, which are very large, almost touch the anthers
surrounding them; therefore the beetles which one frequently sees
crawling over them to feed on the pollen so jar them, no doubt,
as to self-fertilize the flower; but it is scarcely probable
these slow crawlers often transfer the grains from one blossom to
another. A degraded flower like this has little need of color and
perfume, one would suppose; yet it may be even now slowly
perfecting its way toward an ideal of which we see a part only
complete. In deep, rich, moist woods and thickets the. sessile
trillium blooms in April or May, from Pennsylvania, Ohio, and
Minnesota southward nearly to the Gulf.
LARGER BLUE FLAG; BLUE IRIS; FLEUR-DE-LIS; FLOWER-DE-LUCE
(Iris versicolor) Iris family
Flowers - Several, 2 to 3 in. long, violet-blue variegated with
yellow, green, or white, and purple veined. Six divisions of the
perianth: 3 outer ones spreading, recurved; 1 of them bearded,
much longer and wider than the 3 erect inner divisions; all
united into a short tube. Three stamens under 3 overhanging
petal-like divisions of the style, notched at end; under each
notch is a thin plate, smooth on one side, rough and moist
(stigma) on side turned away from anther. Stem: 2 to 3 ft. high,
stout, straight, almost circular, sometimes branching above.
Leaves: Erect, sword-shaped, shorter than stem, somewhat hoary,
from 1/2 to 1 in. wide, folded, and in a compact flat cluster at
base; bracts usually longer than stem of flower. Fruit: Oblong
capsule, not prominently 3-lobed, and with 2 rows of round, flat
seeds closely packed in each cell. Rootstock: Creeping,
horizontal, fleshy.
Preferred Habitat - Marshes, wet meadows.
Flowering Season - May-July.
Distribution - Newfoundland and Manitoba to Arkansas and Florida.
"The fleur-de-lys, which is the flower of chivalry," says Ruskin,
"has a sword for its leaf and a lily for its heart." When that
young and pious Crusader, Louis VII, adopted it for the emblem of
his house, spelling was scarcely an exact science, and the
fleur-de-Louis soon became corrupted into its present form.
Doubtless the royal flower was the white iris, and as li is the
Celtic for white, there is room for another theory as to the
origin of the name. It is our far more regal looking, but truly
democratic blossom, jostling its fellows in the marshes, that is
indeed "born in the purple."
When Napoleon wished to pose as the true successor of those
ancient French kings whose territory included the half of Europe
- ignoring every Louis who ever sat on the throne, for their very
name and emblem had become odious to the people - he discarded
the fleur-de-lis, to replace it with golden bees, the symbol in
armory for industry and perseverance. It is said some relics of
gold and fine stones, somewhat resembling an insect in shape, had
been found in the tomb of Clovis's father, and on the supposition
that these had been bees, Napoleon appropriated them for the
imperial badge. Henceforth "Napoleonic bees" appeared on his
coronation robe and wherever a heraldic emblem could be employed.
But even in the meadows of France Napoleon need not have looked
far from the fleurs-de-lis growing there to find bees. Indeed,
this gorgeous flower is thought by scientists to be all that it
is for the bees' benefit, which, of course, is its own also.
Abundant moisture, from which to manufacture nectar - a prime
necessity with most irises - certainly is for our blue flag. The
large showy blossom cannot but attract the passing bee, whose
favorite color (according to Sir John Lubbock) it waves. The bee
alights on the convenient, spreading platform, and, guided by the
dark veining and golden lines leading to the nectar, sips the
delectable fluid shortly to be changed to honey. Now, as he
raises his head and withdraws it from the nectary, he must rub it
against the pollen-laden anther above, and some of the pollen
necessarily falls on the visitor. As the sticky side of the plate
(stigma), just under the petal-like division of the style, faces
away from the anther, which is below it in any case, the flower
is marvelously guarded against fertilization from its own pollen.
The bee, flying off to another iris, must first brush past the
projecting lip of the over-arching style, and leave on the
stigmatic outer surface of the plate some of the pollen brought
from the first flower, before reaching the nectary. Thus
cross-fertilization is effected; and Darwin has shown how
necessary this is to insure the most vigorous and beautiful
offspring. Without this wonderful adaptation of the flower to the
requirements of its insect friends, and of the insect to the
needs of the flower, both must perish; the former from hunger,
the latter because unable to perpetuate its race. And yet man has
greedily appropriated all the beauties of the floral kingdom as
designed for his sole delight
The name iris, meaning a deified rainbow, which was given this
group of plants by the ancients, shows a fine appreciation of
their superb coloring, their ethereal texture, and the evanescent
beauty of the blossom.
In spite of the name given to another species, the SOUTHERN BLUE
FLAG (I. hexagona) is really the larger one; its leaves, which
are bright green, and never hoary, often equaling the stem in its
height of from two to three feet. The handsome solitary flower,
similar to that of the larger blue flag, nevertheless has its
broad outer divisions fully an inch larger, and is seated in the
axils at the top of the circular stem. The oblong, cylindric,
six-angled capsule also contains two rows of seeds in each
cavity. From South Carolina and Florida to Kentucky, Missouri,
and Texas one finds this iris blooming in the swamps during April
and May.
The SLENDER BLUE FLAG (I. prismatica; I. Virginica of Gray),
found growing from New Brunswick to North Carolina, but mainly
near the coast, and often in the same oozy ground with the larger
blue flag, may be known by its grass-like leaves, two or three of
which usually branch out from the slender flexuous stem; by its
solitary or two blue flowers, variegated with white and veined
with yellow, that rear themselves on slender foot-stems; and by
the sharply three-angled, narrow, oblong capsule, in which but
one row of seeds is borne in each cavity. This is the most
graceful member of a rather stiffly stately family.
POINTED BLUE-EYED GRASS; EYE-BRIGHT; BLUE STAR
(Sisyrinchium angustifolium) Iris family
Flowers - From blue to purple, with a yellow center; a Western
variety, white; usually several buds at the end of stem, between
2 erect unequal bracts; about 1/2 in. across; perianth of 6
spreading divisions, each pointed with a bristle from a notch;
stamens 3, the filaments united to above the middle; pistil 1,
its tip 3-cleft. Stem: 3 to 14 in. tall, pale hoary green, flat,
rigid, 2-edged. Leaves: Grass-like, pale, rigid, mostly from
base. Fruit: 3-celled capsule, nearly globose.
Preferred Habitat - Moist fields and meadows.
Flowering Season - May-August.
Distribution - Newfoundland to British Columbia, from eastern
slope of Rocky Mountains to Atlantic, south to Virginia and
Kansas.
Only for a day, and that must be a bright one, will this "little
sister of the stately blue flag" open its eyes, to close them in
indignation on being picked; nor will any coaxing but the
sunshine's induce it to open them again in water, immediately
after. The dainty flower, growing in dense tufts, makes up in
numbers what it lacks in size and lasting power, flecking our
meadows with purplish ultramarine blue in a sunny June morning.
Later in the day, apparently there are no blossoms there, for all
are tightly closed, never to bloom again. New buds will unfold to
tinge the field on the morrow.
Usually three buds nod from between a pair of bracts, the lower
one of which may be twice the length of the upper one but only
one flower opens at a time. Slight variations in this plant have
been considered sufficient to differentiate several species
formerly included by Gray and other American botanists under the
name of S. Bermudiana.
LARGE or EARLY, PURPLE-FRINGED ORCHIS
(Habenaria grandiflora; H. fimbriata of Gray) Orchid family
Flowers - Pink-purple and pale lilac, sometimes nearly white;
fragrant, alternate, clustered in thick, dense spikes from 3 to
15 in. long. Upper sepal and toothed petals erect; the lip of
deepest shade, 1/2 in. long, fan-shaped, 3-parted, fringed half
its length, and prolonged at base into slender, long spur; stamen
united with style into short column; 2 anther sacs slightly
divergent, the hollow between them glutinous, stigmatic. Stem. 1
to 5 ft. high, angled, twisted. Leaves: Oval, large, sheathing
the stem below; smaller, lance-shaped ones higher up; bracts
above. Root: Thick, fibrous.
Preferred Habitat - Rich, moist meadows, muddy places, woods.
Flowering Season - June-August.
Distribution - New Brunswick to Ontario; southward to North
Carolina, westward to Michigan.
Because of the singular and exquisitely unerring adaptations of
orchids as a family to their insect visitors, no group of plants
has greater interest for the botanist since Darwin interpreted
their marvelous mechanism, and Gray, his instant disciple,
revealed the hidden purposes of our native American species, no
less wonderfully constructed than the most costly exotic in a
millionaire's hothouse.
A glance at the spur of this orchid, one of the handsomest and
most striking of its clan, and the heavy perfume of the flower,
would seem to indicate that only a moth with a long proboscis
could reach the nectar secreted at the base of the thread-like
passage. Butterflies, attracted by the conspicuous color,
sometimes hover about the showy spikes of bloom, but it is
probable that, to secure a sip, all but possibly the very largest
of them must go to the smaller purple-fringed orchis, whose
shorter spur holds out a certain prospect of reward; for, in
these two cases, as in so many others, the flower's welcome for
an insect is in exact proportion to the length of its visitor's
tongue. Doubtless it is one of the smaller sphinx moths, such as
we see at dusk working about the evening primrose and other
flowers deep of chalice, and heavily perfumed to guide visitors
to their feast, that is the great purple-fringed orchid's
benefactor, since the length of its tongue is perfectly adapted
to its needs. Attracted by the showy, broad lower petal, his
wings ever in rapid motion, the moth proceeds to unroll his
proboscis and drain the cup, that is frequently an inch and a
half deep. Thrusting in his head, either one or both of his
large, projecting eyes are pressed against the sticky
button-shaped disks to which the pollen masses are attached by a
stalk, and as he raises his head to depart, feeling that he is
caught, he gives a little jerk that detaches them, and away he
flies with these still fastened to his eyes.
Even while he is flying to another flower, that is to say, in
half a minute, the stalks of the pollen masses bend downward from
the perpendicular and slightly toward the center, or just far
enough to require the moth, in thrusting his proboscis into the
nectary, to strike the glutinous, sticky stigma. Now, withdrawing
his head, either or both of the golden clubs he brought in with
him will be left on the precise spot where they will fertilize
the flower. Sometimes, but rarely, we catch a butterfly or moth
from the smaller or larger purple orchids with a pollen mass
attached to his tongue, instead of to his eyes; this is when he
does not make his entrance from the exact center - as in these
flowers he is not obliged to do - and in order to reach the
nectary his tongue necessarily brushes against one of the sticky
anther sacs. The performance may be successfully imitated by
thrusting some blunt point about the size of a moth's head, a
dull pencil or a knitting-needle, into the flower as an insect
would enter. Withdraw the pencil, and one or both of the pollen
masses will be found sticking to it, and already automatically
changing their attitude. In the case of the large, round-leaved
orchis, whose greenish-white flowers are fertilized in a similar
manner by the sphinx moth, the anther sacs converge, like little
horns; and their change of attitude while they are being carried
to fertilize another flower is quite as exquisitely exact.
Usually in wetter ground than we find its more beautiful big
sister growing in, most frequently in swamps and bogs, the
SMALLER PURPLE-FRINGED ORCHIS (H. psycodes) lifts its perfumed
lilac spires. Thither go the butterflies and long-lipped bees to
feast in July and August. Inasmuch as without their aid the
orchid must perish from its inability to set fertile seed, no
wonder it woos its benefactors with a showy mass of color,
charming fringes, sweet perfume, and copious draughts of nectar,
and makes their visits of the utmost value to itself by the
ingenious mechanism described above. Here is no waste of pollen;
that is snugly packed in little bundles, ready to be carried off,
but placed where they cannot come in contact with the adjoining
stigma, since every orchid, almost without exception, refuses to
be deteriorated through self-fertilization.
>From New Jersey and Illinois southward, particularly in
mountainous regions, if not among the mountains themselves, the
FRINGELESS PURPLE ORCHIS (H. perarnoena) may be found blooming in
moist meadows through July and August. Moisture, from which to
manufacture the nectar that orchids rely upon so largely to
entice insects to work for them, is naturally a prime necessity;
yet Sprengel attempted to prove that many orchids are gaudy shams
and produce no nectar, but exist by an organized system of
deception. "Scheinsaftblumen" he called them. From the number of
butterflies seen hovering about this fringeless orchis and its
more attractive kin, it is small wonder their nectaries are soon
exhausted and they are accused of being gay deceivers. Sprengel's
much-quoted theory would credit moths, butterflies, and even the
highly intelligent bees with scant sense; but Darwin, who
thoroughly tested it, forever exonerated these insects from
imputed stupidity and the flowers from gross dishonesty. He found
that many European orchids secrete their nectar between the outer
and inner walls of the tube, which a bumblebee can easily pierce,
but where Sprengel never thought to look for it. The large lip of
this orchis is not fringed, but has a fine picotee edge. The
showy violet-purple, long-spurred flowers are alternately set on
a stem that is doing its best if it reach a height of two and a
half feet.
WATER-SHIELD or WATER TARGET
(Brasenia purpurea; B. peltata of Gray) Water-lily family
Flowers - Small, dull purplish, about 1/2 in. across, on stout
footstalks from axils of upper leaves; 3 narrow sepals and
petals; stamens 12 to 18; pistils 4 to 18, forming 1 to 3-seeded
pods. Stem: From submerged rootstock; slender, branching, several
feet long, covered with clear jelly, as are footstalks and lower
leaf surfaces. Leaves: On long petioles attached to center of
underside of leaf, floating or rising, oval to roundish, 2 to 4
in. long, 1 1/2 to 2 in. wide.
Preferred Habitat - Still, rather deep water of ponds and slow
streams.
Flowering Season - All summer.
Distribution - Parts of Asia, Africa, and Australia, Nova Scotia
to Cuba, and westward from California to Puget Sound.
Of this pretty water plant Dr. Abbott says, in "Wasteland
Wanderings": "I gathered a number of floating, delicate leaves,
and endeavored to secure the entire stem also; but this was too
difficult a task for an August afternoon. The under side of the
stem and leaf are purplish brown and were covered with
translucent jelly, embedded in which were millions of what I took
to be insects' eggs. They certainly had that appearance. I was
far more interested to find that, usually, beneath each leaf
there was hiding a little pike. The largest was not two inches in
length. When disturbed, they swam a few inches, and seemed wholly
'at sea' if there was not another leaf near by to afford them
shelter."
EUROPEAN or COMMON GARDEN COLUMBINE
(Aquilegia vulgaris) Crowfoot family
Flowers - Showy, blue, purple, or white, 1 1/2 to 2 in. broad, or
about as broad as long; spurs stout and strongly incurved.
General characteristics of plant resembling wild columbine.
Preferred Habitat - Escaped from gardens to woods and fields in
Eastern and Middle States. Native of Europe.
Flowering Season - May-July.
A heavier, less graceful flower than either the wild red and
yellow columbine or the exquisite, long-spurred, blue and white
species (A. coerulea) of the Rocky Mountain region; nevertheless
this European immigrant, now making itself at home here, is a
charming addition to our flora. How are insects to reach the well
of nectar secreted in the tip of its incurved, hooked spur?
Certain of the long-lipped bees, large bumblebees, whose tongues
have developed as rapidly as the flower, are able to drain it.
Hummingbirds, partial to red flowers, fertilize the wild
columbine, but let this one alone. Muller watched a female
bumblebee making several vain attempts to sip this blue one. Soon
the brilliant idea of biting a hole through each spur flashed
through her little brain, and the first experiment proving
delightfully successful, she proceeded to bite holes through
other flowers without first trying to suck them. Apparently she
satisfied her feminine conscience with the reflection that the
flower which made dining so difficult for its benefactors
deserved no better treatment.
FIELD or BRANCHED LARKSPUR; KNIGHT'S-SPUR; LARK-HEEL
(Delphinium Consoilda) Crowfoot family
Flowers - Blue to pinkish and whitish, 1 to 1 1/2 in. long, hung
on slender stems and scattered along spreading branches; 5
petal-like sepals, the rear one prolonged into long, slender,
curving spur; 2 petals, united. Stem: 1 to 2 1/2 ft. high.
Leaves: Divided into very finely cut linear segments. Fruit:
Erect, smooth pod tipped with a short beak; open on one side.
Preferred Habitat - Roadsides and fields.
Flowering Season - June-August.
Distribution - Naturalized from Europe; from New Jersey
southward, occasionally escaped from gardens farther north.
Keats should certainly have extolled the larkspurs in his sonnet
on blue. No more beautiful group of plants contributes to the
charm of gardens, woods, and roadsides, where some have escaped
cultivation and become naturalized, than the delphinium, that
take their name from a fancied resemblance to a dolphin
(delphin), given them by Linnaeus in one of his wild flights of
imagination. Having lost the power to fertilize themselves,
according to Muller, they are pollenized by both bees and
butterflies, insects whose tongues have kept pace with the
development of certain flowers, such as the larkspur, columbine,
and violet, that they may reach into the deep recesses of the
spurs where the nectar is hidden from all but benefactors.
The TALL WILD LARKSPUR (D. urceolatum; D. exaltatum of Gray)
waves long, crowded, downy wands of intense purplish blue in the
rich woods of Western Pennsylvania, southward to the Carolinas
and Alabama, and westward to Nebraska. Its spur is nearly
straight, not to increase the difficulty a bee must have in
pressing his lips through the upper and lower petals to reach the
nectar at the end of it. First, the stamens successively raise
themselves in the passage back of the petals to dust his head;
then, when each has shed its pollen and bent down again, the
pistil takes its turn in occupying the place, so that a
pollen-laden bee, coming to visit the blossom from an earlier
flower; can scarcely help fertilizing it. It is said there are
but two insects in Europe with lips long enough to reach the
bottom of the long horn of plenty hung by the BEE LARKSPUR (D.
elatum), that we know only in gardens here. Its yellowish bearded
lower petals readily deceive one into thinking a bee has just
alighted there.
>From April to June the DWARF LARKSPUR or STAGGER-WEED (D.
tricorne), which, however, may sometimes grow three feet high,
lifts a loose raceme of blue, rarely white, flowers an inch or
more long, at the end of a stout stem rising from a tuberous
root. Its slightly ascending spur, its three widely spreading
seed vessels, and the deeply cut leaf of from five to seven
divisions are distinguishing characteristics. From Western
Pennsylvania and Georgia to Arkansas and Minnesota it is found in
rather stiff soil. Butterflies, which prefer erect flowers, have
some difficulty to cling while they drain the almost upright
spurs, especially the Papilios, which usually suck with their
wings in motion. But the bees, to which the delphinium are best
adapted, although butterflies visit them quite as frequently,
find a convenient landing place prepared for them, and fertilize
the flower while they sip with ease.
More slender, downy, and dwarf of stem than the preceding is the
CAROLINA LARKSPUR (D. Carolinianum), whose blue flowers, varying
to white, and its very finely cleft leaves, may be found in the
South, on prairies in the North and West, and in the Rocky
Mountain region.
LIVER-LEAF; HEPATICA; LIVERWORT; ROUND-LOBED or KIDNEY
LIVER-LEAF; NOBLE LIVER-WORT; SQUIRREL CUP
(Hepalica Hepatica; H. triloba of Gray) Crowfoot family
Flowers - Blue, lavender, purple, pinkish, or white;
occasionally, not always, fragrant; 6 to 12 petal-like, colored
sepals (not petals, as they appear to be), oval or oblong;
numerous stamens, all bearing anthers; pistils numerous 3 small,
sessile leaves, forming an involucre directly under flower,
simulate a calyx, for which they might be mistaken. Stems:
Spreading from the root, 4 to 6 in. high, a solitary flower or
leaf borne at end of each furry stem. Leaves: 3-lobed and
rounded, leathery, evergreen; sometimes mottled with, or
entirely, reddish purple; spreading on ground, rusty at blooming
time, the new leaves appearing after the flowers. Fruit: Usually
as many as pistils, dry, 1-seeded, oblong, sharply pointed, never
opening.
Preferred Habitat - Woods; light soil on hillsides.
Flowering Season - December-May.
Distribution - Canada to Northern Florida, Manitoba to Iowa and
Missouri. Most common East.
Even under the snow itself bravely blooms the delicate hepatica,
wrapped in fuzzy furs as if to protect its stems and nodding buds
from cold. After the plebeian skunk cabbage, that ought scarcely
to be reckoned among true flowers - and William Hamilton Gibson
claimed even before it - it is the first blossom to appear.
Winter sunshine, warming the hillsides and edges of woods, opens
its eyes,
"Blue as the heaven it gates at,
Startling the loiterer in the naked groves
With unexpected beauty; for the time
Of blossoms and green leaves is yet afar."
"There are many things left for May," says John Burroughs, "but
nothing fairer, if as fair, as the first flower, the hepatica. I
find I have never admired this little firstling half enough. When
at the maturity of its charms, it is certainly the gem of the
woods. What an individuality it has! No two clusters alike; all
shades and sizes.... A solitary blue-purple one, fully expanded
and rising over the brown leaves or the green moss, its cluster
of minute anthers showing like a group of pale stars on its
little firmament, is enough to arrest and hold the dullest eye.
Then,...there are individual hepaticas, or individual families
among them, that are sweet scented. The gift seems as capricious
as the gift of genius in families. You cannot tell which the
fragrant ones are till you try them. Sometimes it is the large
white ones, sometimes the large purple ones, sometimes the small
pink ones. The odor is faint and recalls that of the sweet
violets. A correspondent, who seems to have carefully observed
these fragrant hepaticas, writes me that this gift of odor is
constant in the same plant; that the plant which bears
sweet-scented flowers this year will bear them next."
It is not evident that insect aid is necessary to transfer the
tiny, hairy spiral ejected from each cell of the antherid, after
it has burst from ripeness, to the canal of the flask-shaped
organ at whose base the germ-cell is located. Perfect flowers can
fertilize themselves. But pollen-feeding flies, and female hive
bees which collect it, and the earliest butterflies trifle about
the blossoms when the first warm days come. Whether they are
rewarded by finding nectar or not is still a mooted question.
Possibly the papillae which cover the receptacle secrete nectar,
for almost without exception the insect visitors thrust their
proboscides down between the spreading filaments as if certain of
a sip. None merely feed on the pollen except the flies and the
hive bee.
The SHARP-LOBED LIVER-LEAF (Hepatica acuta) differs chiefly from
the preceding in having the ends of the lobes of its leaves and
the tips of the three leaflets that form its involucre quite
sharply pointed. Its range, while perhaps not actually more
westerly, appears so, since it is rare in the East, where its
cousin is so abundant; and common in the West, where the
round-lobed liver-leaf is scarce. It blooms in March and April.
Professor Halsted has noted that this species bears staminate
flowers on one plant and pistillate flowers on another; whereas
the Hepatica Hepatica usually bears flowers of both sexes above
the same root. The blossoms, which close at night to keep warm,
and open in the morning, remain on the beautiful plant for a long
time to accommodate the bees and flies that, in this case, are
essential to the perpetuation of the species.
PURPLE VIRGIN'S BOWER
(Atragene Americana) Crowfoot family
Flowers - Showy, purplish blue, about 3 in. across; 4 sepals,
broadly expanded, thin, translucent, strongly veined, very large,
simulating petals; petals small, spoon-shaped; stamens very
numerous ; styles long, persistent, plumed throughout. Stem:
Trailing or partly climbing with the help of leafstalks and
leaflets. Leaves: Opposite, compounded of 3 egg-shaped, pointed
leaflets on slender petioles.
Preferred Habitat - - Rocky woodlands.
Flowering Season - May-June.
Distribution - Hudson Bay westward, south to Minnesota and
Virginia.
The day on which one finds this rare and beautiful flower in some
rocky ravine high among the hills or mountains becomes memorable
to the budding botanist. At an elevation of three thousand feet
in the Catskills it trails its way over the rocks, fallen trees,
and undergrowth of the forest, suggesting some of the handsome
Japanese species introduced by Sieboldt and Fortune to Occidental
gardens. No one who sees this broadly expanded blossom could
confuse it either with the thick and bell-shaped purple
LEATHER-FLOWER (C. Viorna), so exquisitely feathery in fruit,
that grows in rich, moist soil from Pennsylvania southward and
westward; or with the far more graceful and deliciously fragrant
purple MARSH CLEMATIS (C. crispa) of our Southern States. The
latter, though bell-shaped also, has thin, recurved sepals, and
its persistent styles are silky, not feathery at seed-time.
ORPINE; LIVE-FOREVER; MIDSUMMER-MEN; LIVE-LONG; PUDDING-BAG
PLANT; GARDEN STONECROP; WITCHES' MONEY
(Sedum Telephium) Orpine family
Flowers - Dull purplish, very pale or bright reddish purple in
close, round, terminal clusters, each flower 1/3 in. or less
across, 5-parted, the petals twice as long as the sepals; 10
stamens, alternate ones attached to petals; pistils 4 or 5. Stem:
2 ft. high or less, erect, simple, in tufts, very smooth, pale
green, juicy, leafy. Leaves: Alternate, oval, slightly scalloped,
thick, fleshy, smooth, juicy, pale gray green, with stout midrib,
seated on stalk.
Preferred Habitat - Fields, waysides, rocky soil, originally
escaped from gardens.
Flowering Season - June- September.
Distribution - Quebec westward, south to Michigan and Maryland.
Children know the live-forever, not so well by the variable
flower - for it is a niggardly bloomer - as by the thick leaf
that they delight to hold in the mouth until, having loosened the
membrane, they are able to inflate it like a paper bag. Sometimes
dull, sometimes bright, the flower clusters never fail to attract
many insects to their feast, which is accessible even to those of
short tongues. Each blossom is perfect in itself, i.e., it
contains both stamens and pistils; but to guard against
self-fertilization it ripens its anthers and sheds its pollen on
the insects that carry it away to older flowers before its own
stigmas mature and become susceptible to imported pollen. After
the seed-cases take on color, they might be mistaken for
blossoms.
As if the plant did not already possess enough popular names, it
needs must share with the European goldenrod and our common
mullein the title of Aaron's rod. Sedere, to sit, the root of the
generic name, applies with rare appropriateness to this entire
group that we usually find seated on garden walls, rocks, or, in
Europe, even on the roofs of old buildings. Rooting freely from
the joints, our plant forms thrifty tufts where there is little
apparent nourishment; yet its endurance through prolonged drought
is remarkable. Long after the farmer's scythe, sweeping over the
roadside, has laid it low, it thrives on the juices stored up in
fleshy leaves and stem until it proves its title to the most
lusty of all folk names.
PURPLE or WATER AVENS
(Geum rivale) Rose family
Flowers - Purple, with some orange chrome, 1 in. broad or less,
terminal, solitary, nodding; calyx 5-lobed, purplish, spreading;
5 petals, abruptly narrowed into claws, forming a cup-shaped
corolla; stamens and pistils of indefinite number; the styles,
jointed and bent in middle, persistent, feathery below. Stem: 1
to 2 ft. high, erect, simple or nearly so, hairy, from thickish
rootstock. Leaves: Chiefly from root, on footstems; lower leaves
irregularly parted; the side segments usually few and small; the
1 to 3 terminal segments sharply, irregularly lobed; the few
distant stem leaves 3-foliate or simple, mostly seated on stem.
Fruit: A dry, hairy head stalked in calyx.
Preferred Habitat - Swamps and low, wet ground.
Flowering Season - May-July.
Distribution - Newfoundland far westward, south to Colorado,
eastward to Missouri and Pennsylvania, also northern parts of Old
World.
Mischievous bumblebees, thrusting their long tongues between the
sepals and petals of these unopened flowers, steal nectar without
conferring any favor in return. Later, when they behave properly
and put their heads inside to feast at the disk on which the
stamens are inserted, they dutifully carry pollen from old
flowers to the early maturing stigmas of younger ones.
Self-fertilization must occur, however, if the bees have not
removed all the pollen when a blossom closes. When the purple
avens opens in Europe, the bees desert even the primrose to feast
upon its abundant nectar. Since water is the prime necessity in
the manufacture of this sweet, and since insects that feed upon
it have so much to do with the multiplication of flowers, it is
not surprising that the swamp, which has been called "nature's
sanctuary," should have its altars so exquisitely decked. This
blossom hangs its head, partly to protect its precious nectar
from rain, and partly to make pilfering well nigh impossible to
the unwelcome crawling insect that may have braved the forbidding
hairy stems.
WILD LUPINE; OLD MAID'S BONNETS; WILD PEA; SUN DIAL
(Lupinus perennis) Pea family
Flowers - Vivid blue, very rarely pink or white, butterfly-shaped
corolla consisting of standard, wings, and keel; about 1/2 in.
long, borne in a long raceme at end of stern; calyx 2-lipped,
deeply toothed. Stem: Erect, branching, leafy, to 2 ft. high.
Leaves: Palmnate, compounded of from 7 to 11 (usually 8)
leaflets. Fruit: A broad, flat, very hairy pod, 1 1/2 in. long,
and containing 4 or 5 seeds.
Preferred Habitat - Dry, sandy places, banks, and hillsides.
Flowering Season - May-June.
Distribution - United States east of Mississippi, and eastern
Canada.
Farmers once thought that this plant preyed upon the fertility of
their soil, as we see in the derivation of its name, from lupus,
a wolf; whereas the lupine contents itself with sterile waste
land no one should grudge it - steep gravelly banks, railroad
tracks, exposed sunny hills, where even it must often burn out
under fierce sunshine did not its root penetrate to surprising
depths. It spreads far and wide in thrifty colonies, reflecting
the vivid color of June skies, until, as Thoreau says, "the earth
is blued with it."
What is the advantage gained in the pea-shaped blossom? As usual,
the insect that fertilizes the flower best knows the answer. The
corolla has five petals, the upper one called the standard,
chiefly a flaunted advertisement; two side wings, or platforms,
to alight on; and a keel like a miniature boat, formed by the two
lower petals, whose edges meet. In this the pistil, stamens, and
nectar are concealed and protected. The pressure of a bee's
weight as he alights on the wings, light as it must be, is
nevertheless sufficient to depress and open the keel, which is
elastically affected by their motion, and so to expose the pollen
just where the long-lipped bee must rub off some against his
underside as he sucks the nectar. He actually seems to pump the
pollen that has fallen into the forward part of the keel upon
himself, as he moves about. As soon as he leaves the flower, the
elastic wings resume their former position, thus closing the keel
to prevent waste of pollen. Take a sweet pea from the garden,
press down its wings with the thumb and forefinger to imitate the
action of the bee on them; note how the keel opens to display its
treasures, and resumes its customary shape when the pressure is
removed.
The lupine is another of those interesting plants which go to
sleep at night. Some members of the genus erect one half of the
leaf and droop the other half until it becomes a vertical instead
of the horizontal star it is by day. Frequently the leaflets
rotate as much as 90 degrees on their own axes. Some lupines fold
their leaflets, not at night only, but during the day also there
is more or less movement in the leaves. Sun dial, a popular name
for the wild lupine, has reference to this peculiarity. The leaf
of our species shuts downward around its stem, umbrella fashion,
or the leaflets are erected to prevent the chilling which comes
to horizontal surfaces by radiation, some scientists think. "That
the sleep movements of leaves are in some manner of high
importance to the plants which exhibit them," says Darwin, "few
will dispute who have observed how complex they sometimes are."
CANADIAN or SHOWY TICK-TREFOIL
(Meibomia Canadensis; Desmodium Canadense of Gray) Pea family
Flowers - Pinkish or bluish purple, butterfly-shaped, about 1/2
in. long, borne in dense, terminal, elongated racemes. Stem;
Erect, hairy, leafy, 2 to 8 ft. high. Leaves: Compounded of 3
oblong leaflets, the central one largest; upper leaves nearly
seated on stem; bracts, conspicuous before flowering, early
falling off. Fruit: A flat pod, about 1 in. long, jointed, and
covered with minute hooked bristles, the lower edge of pod
scalloped; almost seated in calyx.
Preferred Habitat - Thickets, woods, riverbanks, bogs. Flowering
Season - July-September.
Distribution - New Brunswick to Northwest Territory, south to
North Carolina, westward to Indian Territory and Dakota.
As one travels hundreds or even thousands of miles in a
comfortable railway carriage and sees the same flowers growing
throughout the length and breadth of the area, one cannot but
wonder however the plants manage to make the journey. We know
some creep along the ground, or under it, a tortoise pace, but a
winning one; that some send their offspring flying away from
home, like dandelions and thistles; and many others with wings
and darts are blown by the wind. Berries have their seeds dropped
afar by birds. Aquatic plants and those that grow beside running
water travel by river and flood. European species reach our
shores among the ballast. Darwin raised over sixty wild plants
from seed carried in a pellet of mud taken from the leg of a
partridge. So on and so on. The imagination delights to picture
these floral vagabonds, each with its own clever method of
getting a fresh start in the world. But by none of these methods
just mentioned do the tick-trefoils spread abroad. Theirs is
indeed a by hook or by crook system. The scalloped, jointed pod,
where the seeds lie concealed, has minute crooked bristles, which
catch in the clothing of man or beast, so that every herd of
sheep, every dog, every man, woman, or child who passes through a
patch of trefoils gives them a lift. After a walk through the
woods and lanes of late summer and autumn, one's clothes reveal
scores of tramps that have stolen a ride in the hope of being
picked off and dropped amid better conditions in which to rear a
family.
Only the largest bees can easily "explode" the showy
tick-trefoil. A bumblebee alights upon a flower, thrusts his head
under the base of the standard petal, and forces apart the wing
petals with his legs, in order to dislodge them from the
standard. This motion causes the keel, also connected with the
standard, to snap down violently, thus releasing the column
within and sending upward an explosion of pollen on the under
surface of the bee. Here we see the wing petals acting as
triggers to discharge the flower. Depress them and up flies the
fertilizing dust - once. The little gun will not "go off" twice.
No nectar rewards the visitor, which usually is a
pollen-collecting bee. The highly intelligent and important
bumblebee has the advantage over his smaller kin in being able to
discharge the pollen from both large and smaller flowers.
The NAKED-FLOWERED TICK-TREFOIL (M. nudiflora; D. nudiflorum of
Gray) lifts narrow, few-flowered panicles of rose-purple blooms
during July and August. The flowers are much smaller than those
of the showy trefoil; however, when seen in masses, they form
conspicuous patches of color in dry woods. Note that there is a
flower stalk which is usually leafless and also a leaf-bearing
stem rising from the base of the plant, the latter with its
leaves all crowded at the top, if you would distinguish this very
common species from its multitudinous kin. The trefoliate leaves
are pale beneath. The two or three jointed pod rises far above
the calyx on its own stalk, as in the next species.
The POINTED-LEAVED TICK-TREFOIL (M. grandifiora; D. acuminatum of
Gray) has for its distinguishing feature a cluster of leaves high
up on the same stem from which rises a stalk bearing a quantity
of purple flowers that are large by comparison only. The leaves
have leaflets from two to six inches long, rounded on the sides,
but acutely pointed, and with scattered hairs above and below.
This trefoil is found blooming in dry or rocky woods, throughout
a wide range, from June to September.
Lying outstretched for two to six feet on the dry ground of open
woods and copses east of the Mississippi, the PROSTRATE
TICK-TREFOIL (M. Michauxii; D. rotundifoliurn of Gray) can
certainly be named by its soft hairiness, the almost perfect
roundness of its trefoliate leaves, its rather loose racemes of
deep purple flowers that spring both from the leaf axils and from
the ends of the sometimes branching stem; and by its three to
five jointed pod, which is deeply scalloped on its lower edge and
somewhat indented above, as well.
BLUE, TUFTED, or COW VETCH or TARE; CAT PEAS; TINEGRASS
(Vicia Cracca) Pea family
Flowers - Blue, later purple; 1/2 in. long, growing downward in
1-sided spike, 15 to 40 flowered; calyx oblique, small, with
unequal teeth; corolla butterfly-shaped, consisting of standard,
wings, and keel, all oblong; the first clawed, the second
oblique, and adhering to the shorter keel; 10 stamens, 1 detached
from other 9. Stem: Slender, weak, climbing or trailing, downy, 2
to 4 ft. long. Leaves: Tendril bearing, divided into 18 to 24
thin, narrow, oblong leaflets. Fruit: A smooth pod 1 in. long or
less, 5 to 8 seeded.
Preferred Habitat - Dry soil, fields, wastelands.
Flowering Season - June-August.
Distribution - United States from New Jersey, Kentucky, and Iowa
northward and northwestward. Europe and Asia.
Dry fields blued with the bright blossoms of the tufted vetch,
and roadsides and thickets where the angular vine sends forth
vivid patches of color, resound with the music of happy bees.
Although the parts of the flower fit closely together, they are
elastic, and opening with the energetic visitor's weight and
movement give ready access to the nectary. On his departure they
resume their original position, to protect both nectar and pollen
from rain and pilferers whose bodies are not perfectly adapted to
further the flower's cross-fertilization. The common bumblebee
(Bombus terrestris) plays a mean trick, all too frequently, when
he bites a hole at the base of the blossom, not only gaining easy
access to the sweets for himself, but opening the way for others
less intelligent than he, but quite ready to profit by his
mischief, and so defeat nature's plan. Dr. Ogle observed that the
same bee always acts in the same manner, one sucking the nectar
legitimately, another always biting a hole to obtain it
surreptitiously, the natural inference, of course, being that
some bees, like small boys, are naturally depraved.
In cultivated fields and waste places farther south and westward
to the Pacific Coast roams the COMMON or PEBBLE VETCH OR TARE (V.
saliva), another domesticated weed that has come to us from
Europe, where it is extensively grown for fodder. Let no reproach
fall on these innocent plants that bear an opprobrious name: the
tare of Scripture is altogether different, the bearded darnel of
Mediterranean regions, whose leaves deceive one by simulating
those of wheat, and whose smaller seeds, instead of nourishing
man, poison him. Only one or two light blue-purple flowers grow
in the axils of the leaves of our common vetch. The leaf,
compounded of from eight to fourteen leaflets, indented at the
top, has a long terminal tendril, whose little sharp tip assists
the awkward vine, like a grappling hook.
The AMERICAN VETCH or TARE or PEA VINE (V. Americana) boasts
slightly larger bluish-purple flowers than the blue vetch, but
fewer of them; from three to nine only forming its loose raceme.
In moist soil throughout a very broad northerly and westerly
range it climbs and trails its graceful way, with the help of the
tendrils on the tips of leaves compounded of from eight to
fourteen oblong, blunt, and veiny leaflets.
BEACH, SEA, SEASIDE, or EVERLASTING PEA
(Lathyrus maritimus) Pea family
Flowers - Purple, butterfly-shaped, consisting of standard petal,
wings, and keel; 1 in. long or less, clustered in short raceme at
end of slender footstalk from leaf axils; calyx 5-toothed;
stamens 10 (9 and 1); style curved, flattened, bearded on inner
side. Stem: to 2 ft. long, stout, reclining, spreading, leafy.
Leaves: Compounded of 3 to 6 pairs of oblong leaflets somewhat
larger than halberd-shaped stipules at base of leaf; branched
tendrils at end of it. Fruit: A flat, 2-valved, veiny pod,
continuous between the seeds.
Preferred Habitat - Beaches of Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, also
of Great Lakes.
Flowering Season - May-August. Sometimes blooming again in
autumn.
Distribution - New Jersey to Arctic Circle; also Northern Europe
and Asia.
Sturdy clumps of the beach pea, growing beyond reach of the tide
in the dunes and sandy wastelands back of the beach, afford the
bee the last restaurant where he may regale himself without fear
of drowning. From some members of the pea family, as from the
wild lupine, for example, his weight, as he moves about, actually
pumps the pollen that has fallen into the forward part of the
blossom's keel onto his body, that he may transfer it to another
flower. In some other members his weight so depresses the keel
that the stamens are forced out to dust him over, the flower
resuming its original position to protect its nectar and the
remaining pollen just as soon as the pressure is removed. Other
peas, again, burst at his pressure, and discharge their pollen on
him. Now, in the beach pea, and similarly in the vetches, the
style is hairy on its inner side, to brush out the pollen on the
visitor who sets the automatic sweeper in motion as he alights
and moves about. So perfectly have many members of this
interesting family adapted their structure to the requirements of
insects, and so implicitly do they rely on their automatic
mechanism, that they have actually lost the power to fertilize
themselves.
In moist or wet ground throughout a northern range from ocean to
ocean, the MARSH VETCHLING (Lathyrus palustris) bears its purple,
butterfly-shaped flowers, that are the merest trifle over half
the size of those of the beach pea. From two to six of these
little blossoms are alternately set along the end of the stalk.
The leaflets, which are narrowly oblong, and acute at the apex,
stand up opposite each other in pairs (from two to four) along
the main leafstalk, that splits at the end to form hooked
tendrils.
BUTTERFLY or BLUE PEA
(Clitoria Mariana) Pea family
Flowers - Bright lavender blue, showy, about 2 in. long; from 1
to 3 borne on a short peduncle. Calyx tubular, 5-toothed; corolla
butterfly-shaped, consisting of very large, erect standard petal,
notched at rounded apex; 2 oblong, curved wings, and shorter,
acute keel; 10 stamens; style incurved, and hairy along inner
side. Stem: Smooth, ascending or partly twining, 1 to 3 ft. high.
Leaves: Compounded of 3 oblong leaflets, paler beneath, each on
short stalk. Fruit: A few-seeded, acutely pointed pod about 1 in.
long.
Preferred Habitat - Dry soil.
Flowering Season - June-July.
Distribution - New Jersey to Florida, westward to Missouri,
Texas, and Mexico.
A beautiful blossom, flaunting a large banner out of all
proportion to the size of its other parts, that it may arrest the
attention of its benefactors the bees. According to Henderson,
the plant, which is found in our Southern States and over the
Mexican border, grows also in the Khasia Mountains of India, but
in no intervening place. Several members of the tropic-loving
genus, that produce large, highly colored flowers, have been
introduced to American hothouses; but the blue butterfly pea is
our only native representative. The genus is thought to take its
name from kleio, to shut up, in reference to the habit these peas
have of seeding long before the flower drops off.
WILD or HOG PEANUT
(Falcata comosa; Amphicarpaea monoica of Gray) Pea family
Flowers - Numerous small, showy ones, borne in drooping clusters
from axils of upper leaves; lilac, pale purplish, or rarely
white, butterfly-shaped, consisting of standard petal partly
enfolding wings and keel. Calyx tubular, 4 or 5 toothed; 10
stamens (9 and 1); 1 pistil. (Also solitary fertile flowers,
lacking petals, on thread-like, creeping branches from lower
axils or underground). Stem: Twining wiry brownish-hairy, to 8
ft. long. Leaves: Compounded of 3 thin leaflets, egg-shaped at
base, acutely pointed at tip. Fruit: Hairy pod 1 in. long. Also
1-seeded, pale, rounded, underground peanut.
Preferred Habitat - Moist thickets, shady roadsides.
Flowering Season - August-September.
Distribution - New Brunswick westward to Nebraska, south to Gulf
of Mexico.
Amphicarpaea ("seed at both ends"), the Greek name by which this
graceful vine was formerly known, emphasizes its most interesting
feature, that, nevertheless, seems to many a foolish duplication
of energy on Nature's part. Why should the same plant bear two
kinds of blossoms and seeds? Among the foliage of low shrubbery
and plants in shady lanes and woodside thickets, we see the
delicate, drooping clusters of lilac blossoms hanging where bees
can readily discover them and, in pilfering their sweets,
transfer their pollen from flower to flower. But in case of
failure to intercross these blossoms that are dependent upon
insect help to set fertile seed, what then? Must the plant run
the risk of extinction? Self-fertilization may be an evil, but
failure to produce seed at all is surely the greatest one. To
guard against such a calamity, insignificant looking flowers that
have no petals to open for the enticing of insects, but which
fertilize themselves with their own pollen, produce abundant seed
close to the ground or under it.Then what need of the showy
blossoms hanging in the thicket above? Close inbreeding in the
vegetable world, as in the animal, ultimately produces degenerate
offspring; and although the showy lilac blossoms of the wild
peanut yield comparatively few cross-fertilized seeds, these are
quite sufficient to enable the vine to maintain those desired
features which are the inheritance from ancestors that struggled
in their day and generation after perfection. No plant dares
depend upon its cleistogamous or blind flowers alone for
offspring; and in the sixty or more genera containing these
curious growths, that usually look like buds arrested in
development, every plant that bears them bears also showy flowers
dependent upon cross-pollination by insect aid.