Flora Pittsburghensis

Author: Father Pitt

  • Ground Cherry (Physalis pubescens)

    Ground cherries grow almost wherever there is ground. We have two species in the area; both produce edible fruit inside their little Japanese lanterns, although it’s not usually much good until a week or two after it falls off the plant. (The papery lantern is toxic, so don’t eat it.) This Physalis pubescens grew in Bird Park, Mount Lebanon.

    The flowers face downward and so are easily missed, but they’re worth examining closer. The color is primrose yellow with mahogany splotches around the center. They look like little Tiffany lanpshades, almost always held wide open and facing the ground.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    PHYSALIS L. GROUND CHERRY
    Calyx 5-cleft, reticulated and enlarging after flowering, at length much inflated and inclosing the 2-celled globular (edible) berry. Corolla between wheel-shaped and funnel-form, the very short tube marked with 5 concave spots at the base; the plaited border somewhat 5-lobed or barely 5-10-toothed. Stamens 5, erect; anthers separate, opening lengthwise. Ours herbs with extra-axillary peduncles; flowering through the summer. (Name physalis, a bladder, from the inflated calyx.)

    P. pubescens L. Pubescent but not hoary; leaves thin, entire at least near the oblique but rarely cordate base; stem slender, geniculate, diffusely branched; fruiting calyx subglobose, shortly acuminate, carinately b-angled. Pa. to Va., and westw.

  • New York Ironweed (Vernonia noveboracensis)

    Vernonia-noveboracensis-2009-10-03-01

    Hard to distinguish from Tall Ironweed, with which it apparently hybridizes. The height is a clue, but conditions can make Tall Ironweed as short as New York Ironweed. This specimen was found in an old cemetery in Beechview. Gray puts Pittsburgh out of the range of New York Ironweed, but most other authorities agree in placing it here. The distinction between Vernonia altissima and Vernonia noveboracensis is sketchy enough, however, that all our ironweeds may be races of the same species. In any event, the Tall Ironweed seems to be our most common.

    The vivid purple of the ironweeds makes them one of our most spectacular native flowers, and enlightened gardeners are beginning to adopt them as ornamentals.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    VERNONIA Schreb. IRONWEED
    Heads discoid, 16-many-flowered, in corymbose cymes; flowers perfect; involucre shorter than the flowers, of much imbricated bracts. Achenes cylindrical, ribbed; pappus double, the outer of minute scale-like bristles, the inner of copious capillary bristles. Perennial herbs, with leafy steins, alternate acuminate or very acute serrate leaves and mostly purple (rarely white) flowers. (Named for William Vernon, an early English botanist, who traveled in North America. )

    V. noveboracensis Willd. Rather tall (1-2 m.); leaves long-lanceolate to lance-oblong, more or less pubescent beneath, gradually narrowed but not at all acuminate toward the base; cyme open; heads mostly 30-40-flowered; involucre purplish (or in white-flowered individuals green), campanulate; the bracts ovate or lance-ovate, with loosely ascending or recurved-spreading filiform tips; pappus purple or purplish. Low ground near the coast, Mass, to Va. and Miss.; reported from Pelee I., L. Erie (Macoun).

  • Chicory (Cichorium intybus)

    Cichorium-intybus-2009-10-01-01-b

    The distinctive sky-blue flowers make Chicory unmistakable. Varieties of Chicory are used as salad greens and as a coffee substitute or additive. It grows along roadsides, and seems especially happy in a crack in the asphalt at the edge of a parking lot. This plant grew beside an alley in the South Side flats.

    Gray describes the genus and the single species in our area:

    CICHÓRIUM [Tourn.] L. SUCCORY or CHICORY

    Heads several-flowered. Involucre double, herbaceous, the inner of 8-10, the outer of 5 short and spreading bracts. Achenes striate; pappus of numerous small chaffy scales, forming a short crown. Branching perennials, with deep roots; the sessile heads 2 or 3 together, axillary and terminal, or solitary on short thickened branches. Flowers bright blue, varying to purple or pink (rarely white), showy. (Altered from the Arabian name of the plant.)

    1. C. INTYBUS L. (COMMON C., BLUE SAILORS.) Stem-leaves oblong or lanceolate, partly clasping, the lowest runicate, those of the rigid flowering branches minute. (Including var. divaricatum of Am. auth., probably not of DC.) Roadsides and fields, Nfd. to Minn., and southw. July-Oct. (Nat. from Eu.)

  • Spotted Knapweed (Centaurea maculosa)

    Centaurea-maculosa-2009-09-25-01-b

    A close relative of the garden Bachelor’s Button (Centaurea cyanus), this is a European import found especially along railroad tracks; this one was by a disused siding in Oakmont. The color is variable from purple through white.

    From Gray’s Manual: C. MACULOSA Lam. Pubescent or glabrate, with ascending rather wiry branches; involucre ovoid-cainpanulate, in fruit becoming open-campanulate; the outer and middle ovate bracts with rather firm points and with 5-7 pairs of cilia at the dark tip; innermost bracts elongate, entire or lacerate; corollas whitish, rose-pink, or purplish, the marginal falsely radiate. Waste places, roadsides, etc., N. E. to N. J.
    (Adv. from Eu.)

  • Creeping Bellflower (Campanula rapunculoides)

    Campanula-rapunculoides-2009-10-02-01

    A European garden flower escaped from cultivation, often in yards of older homes where it had originally been planted. This plant grew at the edge of a sidewalk in Beechview in the shadow of a tall hedge.

    From Gray’s Manual: C. RAPUNCULOIDES L. Stems slender, 6-10 dm. high, smoothish, or finely pubescent above; lower leaves long-petioled, cordate-ovate ; the upper ovate-lanceolate, short-petioled to sessile, irregularly serrate-dentate, hispidulous beneath; flowers nodding, single in the axils of bracts, forming racemes; calyx and capsule scabrous-puberulent; corolla campanulate, 2-3 cm. long; capsule opening by pores at base. Roadsides, thickets, etc., e. Que. to Ont., 0., and s. N. Y. July, Aug. (Introd. from Eurasia.) Var. UCRANICA (Bess.) C. Koch. Smoother; the calyx and capsule essentially glabrous. Similar situations, Que. and N. E. (Introd. from Russia.)

    Although Gray says it blooms in July and August, this plant was part of a colony happily blooming in early October.