[Illustration: WATER HYACINTH]
Aquatic plants; leaves alternate, often basal; sepals 3, petal-like;
petals 3, sepals and petals partly united; ovary 3-celled.
Water Hyacinth (_Eichhornia crassipes_) is also called wampee, river
raft, and water orchid. It grows so thick in places that water channels
may be blocked, and island-like masses may serve as rafts. With its
large spikes of lavender flowers and its broad shining leaves with their
curious bulbous floats, it is the queen of our water plants. Many
streams, lakes, and canals along the coastal highway offer living
pictures which will not soon fade from the memory. The plants float by
means of the bulbous enlargement of the leaf stalk. The flowers are
somewhat 2-lipped, the 3 sepals and 3 petals somewhat alike but with a
yellow spot on the upper petal.
Pickerel Weed (_Pontedaria cordata_) may be found growing in the mud of
inland waters along the coast. It is a taller plant than the water
hyacinth, the spikes are narrower, the flowers are a deeper purple, and
the leaves are narrower and have no float.