_Solidago_
When these flowers transform whole acres into “fields of the
cloth-of-gold,” the slender wands swaying by every roadside, and
Purple Asters add the final touch of imperial splendor to the autumn
landscape, already glorious with gold and crimson, is any parterre of
Nature’s garden the world around more gorgeous than that portion of it
we are pleased to call ours? Within its limits eighty-five species of
golden-rod flourish, while a few have strayed into Mexico and South
America, and only two or three belong to Europe, where many of ours
are tenderly cultivated in gardens, as they would be here, had not
Nature been so lavish. To name all these species, or the asters, the
sparrows, and the warblers at sight is a feat probably no one living
can perform; nevertheless, certain of the commoner golden-rods have
well-defined peculiarities that a little field practice soon fixes in
the novice’s mind.
Along shady roadsides, and in moist woods and thickets, from August to
October, the Blue-stemmed, Wreath, or Woodland Golden-rod (_S. caesia_)
sways an unbranched stem with a bluish bloom on it. It is studded with
pale golden clusters of tiny florets in the axils of lance-shaped,
feather-veined leaves for nearly its entire length. Range from Maine,
Ontario, and Minnesota to the Gulf states. None is prettier, more
dainty, than this common species.
In rich woodlands and thicket borders we find the Zig-zag or
Broad-leaved Golden-rod (_S. latifolia_)--its prolonged, angled stem
that grows as if waveringly uncertain of the proper direction to take,
strung with small clusters of yellow florets, somewhat after the manner
of the preceding species. But its saw-edged leaves are ovate, sharply
tapering to a point, and narrowed at the base into petioles. It blooms
from July to September. Range from New Brunswick to Georgia, and
westward beyond the Mississippi.
During the same blooming period, and through a similar range, our only
albino, with an Irish-bull name, the White Golden-rod, or more properly
Silver-rod (_S. bicolor_), cannot be mistaken. Its cream-white florets
also grow in little clusters from the upper axils of a usually simple
and hairy gray stem six inches to four feet high. Most of the heads are
crowded in a narrow, terminal pyramidal cluster. This plant approaches
more nearly the idea of a rod than its relatives. The leaves, which are
broadly oblong toward the base of the stem, and narrowed into long
margined petioles, are frequently quite hairy, for the silver-rod elects
to live in dry soil and its juices must be protected from heat and too
rapid transpiration.
When crushed in the hand, the _dotted_, bright green, lance-shaped,
entire leaves of the Sweet Golden-rod or Blue Mountain Tea (_S. odora_)
cannot be mistaken, for they give forth a pleasant anise scent. The
slender, simple smooth stem is crowned with a graceful panicle, whose
branches have the florets seated all on one side. Dry soil. New England
to the Gulf states. July to September.
The Wrinkle-leaved, or Tall, Hairy Golden-rod or Bitterweed (_S.
rugosa_), a perversely variable species, its hairy stem perhaps only a
foot high, or, maybe, more than seven feet, its rough leaves broadly
oval to lance-shaped, sharply saw-edged, few if any furnished with
footstems, lifts a large, compound, and gracefully curved panicle, whose
florets are seated on one side of its spreading branches. Sometimes the
stem branches at the summit. One usually finds it blooming in dry soil
from July to November throughout a range extending from Newfoundland and
Ontario to the Gulf states.
The unusually beautiful, spreading, recurved, branching panicle of bloom
borne by the early, Plume, or Sharp-toothed Golden-rod or Yellow-top
(_S. juncea_), so often dried for winter decoration, may wave four feet
high but, usually not more than two, at the summit of a smooth, rigid
stem. Toward the top, narrow, elliptical, uncut leaves are seated on the
stalk; below, much larger leaves, their sharp teeth slanting forward,
taper into a broad petiole, whose edges may be cut like fringe. In dry,
rocky soil this is, perhaps, the first and last golden-rod to bloom,
having been found as early as June, and sometimes lasting into November.
Range from North Carolina and Missouri very far north.
Perhaps the commonest of all the lovely clan east of the Mississippi, or
throughout a range extending from Arizona and Florida northward to
British Columbia and New Brunswick, is the Canada Golden-rod or
Yellow-weed (_S. canadensis_). Surely every one must be familiar with
the large, spreading, dense-flowered panicle, with recurved sprays, that
crowns a rough, hairy stem sometimes eight feet tall, or again only two
feet. Its lance-shaped, acutely pointed, triple-nerved leaves are rough,
and the lower ones saw-edged. From August to November one cannot fail to
find it blooming in dry soil.
Most brilliantly colored of its tribe is the low-growing Gray or Field
Golden-rod or Dyer’s Weed (_S. nemoralis_). The rich, deep yellow of its
little spreading recurved, and usually one-sided panicles is admirably
set off by the ashy gray, or often cottony, stem, and the hoary,
grayish-green leaves in the open, sterile places where they arise from
July to November. Quebec and the Northwest Territory to the Gulf states.
“Along the roadside, like the flowers of gold
That tawny Incas for their gardens wrought,
Heavy with sunshine droops the golden-rod.”
Bewildered by the multitude of species, and wondering at the enormous
number of representatives of many of them, we cannot but inquire into
the cause of such triumphal conquest of a continent by a single genus.
Much is explained simply in the statement that golden-rods belong to the
vast order of _Compositae_, flowers in reality made up sometimes of
hundreds of minute florets united into a far-advanced socialistic
community having for its motto, “In union there is strength.” In the
first place, such an association of florets makes a far more conspicuous
advertisement than a single flower, one that can be seen by insects at a
great distance; for most of the composite plants live in large colonies,
each plant, as well as each floret, helping the others in attracting
their benefactors’ attention. The facility with which insects are
enabled to collect both pollen and nectar makes the golden-rods
exceedingly popular restaurants. Finally, the visits of insects are more
likely to prove effectual, because any one that alights must touch
several or many florets, and cross-pollinate them simply by crawling
over a head. The disk florets mostly contain both stamens and pistil,
while the ray florets in one series are all male. Immense numbers of
wasps, hornets, bees, flies, beetles, and “bugs” feast without effort
here: indeed, the budding entomologist might form a large collection of
_Hymenoptera, Diptera, Coleoptera_, and _Hemiptera_ from among the
visitors to a single field of golden-rod alone. Usually to be discovered
among the throng are the velvety black _Lytta_ or _Cantharis_, that
impostor wasp-beetle, the black and yellow wavy-banded, red-legged
locust-tree borer, and the painted _Clytus_, banded with yellow and
sable, squeaking contentedly as he gnaws the florets that feed him.
Where the slender, brown, plume-tipped wands etch their charming
outline above the snow-covered fields, how the sparrows, finches,
buntings, and juncos love to congregate, of course helping to scatter
the seeds to the wind while satisfying their hunger on the swaying,
down-curved stalks. Now that the leaves are gone, some of the golden-rod
stems are seen to bulge as if a tiny ball were concealed under the bark.
In spring a little winged tenant, a fly, will emerge from the gall that
has been his cradle all winter.