Flora Pittsburghensis

Author: Father Pitt

  • Sow Thistle (Sonchus oleraceus)

    Nasty prickly weeds that they are, the Sow Thistles have a certain architectural elegance. The buds are shaped like a fine glass vase, and the clasping leaves are a particulary attractive dark green. Sow Thistles are edible, apparently, if you catch them young or don’t mind sticking sharp things in your mouth. This one was blooming beside a telephone pole in Beechview in early November.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    SONCHUS [Tourn.] L. SOW THISTLE.
    Heads many-flowered, becoming tumid at base. Involucre more or less imbricated. Achenes obcompressed, ribbed or striate, not beake; pappus copious, of very white exceedingly soft and fine bristles mainly falling together. Leafy -stemmed coarse weeds, chiefly smooth and glaucous, with corymbed or umbellate heads of yellow flowers produced in summer and autumn. (The ancient Greek name.)

    Annual; flowers pale yellow.

    S. OLERACEUS L. (COMMON S.) Stem-leaves runcinate-pinnatifid, rarely undivided, slightly toothed with soft spiny teeth, clasping by a heart-shaped base, the auricles acute; involucre downy when young; achenes striate, also wrinkled transversely. Waste places, chiefly in manured soil and around dwellings. (Nat. from Eu.)

  • Woodland Sunflower (Helianthus divaricatus)

    Normally a late-summer flower, but this one was gamely blooming in early November after more than one frost, when perennial sunflowers are supposed to be settling in for the winter. It likes shade, and is happiest at the edge of a woodland clearing; this one was growing along a thickly wooded street in Beechview. Note the opposite lanceolate leaves with shallow teeth and the slightly sloppy downward-facing pointed bracts.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    HELIANTHUS L. SUNFLOWER
    Heads many-flowered; rays several or many, neutral. Involucre imbricated, herbaceous or foliaceous. Receptacle flat or convex; the persistent chaff embracing the 4-sided and laterally compressed smooth achenes, which are neither winged nor margined. Pappus very deciduous, of 2 thin chaffy scales on the principal angles, and sometimes 2 or more small intermediate scales. —Coarse and stout herbs, with solitary or corymbed heads, and yellow rays; flowering toward autumn. (Named from helios, the sun, and anthos, a flower.)

    H. divaricatus L. Stem simple or forked and corymbed at the top, 0.5-2 m. high, smooth below; leaves all opposite and divaricate, ovate-lanceolate, 3-nerved from the rounded or truncate sessile base, tapering gradually to a sharp point, 0.5-2 dm. long, serrate, thickish, rough both sides; bracts narrowly lanceolate, attenuate, ciliate, equaling the disk (1 cm. wide); rays 8-12, 2.5 cm. long. Thickets and barrens, s. Me. to L. Winnipeg, Neb., and southw.

  • White Sweet Clover (Melilotus albus)

    The height of its season is the late spring and early summer, but don’t count White Sweet Clover out at any season. This plant was sticking its head through a chain-link fence in Beechview in early November. Imported for fodder, White Sweet Clover and the similar yellow species M. officinalis (almost indistinguishable until the flowers appear) have made themselves at home here to such an extent that some regard them as pests. Nevertheless, as nitrogen-fixers that cattle like to eat, they give us a lot in return for the inconvenience they cause us.

    Gray takes Melilotus as feminine, though modern botanists have conspired to claim the name for the masculine side. He describes the genus and species:

    MELILOTUS [Tourn.] Hill. MELILOT. SWEET CLOVER.
    Flowers much as in Trifolium, but in spike-like racemes, small. Corolla deciduous, free from the stamen-tube. Pod ovoid, coriaceous, wrinkled, longer than the calyx, scarcely dehiscent, 1-2-seeded. Annual or biennial herbs, fragrant in drying, with pinnately 3-foliolate leaves. (Name from meli, honey, and lotos, some leguminous plant.)

    M. ALBA Desr. (WHITE M.) Tall; leaflets narrowly obovate to oblong, serrate, truncate or emarginate ; corolla white, 4-5 mm. long, the standard longer than the other petals pod 3-4 mm. long, somewhat reticulate. Rich soil, roadsides, etc., common. (Nat. from Eu.)

  • Wild Geranium (Geranium maculatum)

    Geranium-maculatum-2008-05-02-Fox-Chapel-01

    The flowers are most commonly pink, but occasionally found in this attractive bluish lavender color. Also known as Cranesbill, because of the distinctive seedpods that look like the head of a long-billed bird. The “bill” is an ingenious spring-loaded mechanism that, when the pod dries, suddenly releases and flings the seeds into the air with amazing force. Wild Geranium is a popular garden perennial for shady yards; its close relatives, the florists’ geraniums (which have similar crane’s-bill seedpods), are placed in the genus Pelargonium by botanists. This plant was blooming in early May near the Trillium Trail in Fox Chapel.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    GERANIUM [Tourn.] L. CRANESBILL
    Stamens 10 (rarely 6), all with perfect anthers, the 5 longer with glands at their base (alternate with the petals). Styles smooth inside in fruit when they separate from the axis. Stems forking. Peduncles 1-3-flowered. (An old Greek name, from geranos, a crane; the long fruit-bearing beak thought to resemble the bill of that bird.)

    G. maculatum L. (WILD G.) Erect, hairy; leaves about 5-parted, the wedge-shaped divisions lobed and cut at the end; sepals slender-pointed; pedicels and beak of fruit hairy but not glandular; petals entire, light purple, bearded on the claw. Open woods and fields, centr. Me. to Man., and southw. Apr.-July.

  • Snapdragon (Antirrhinum majus)

    Antirrhinum-majus-2009-11-03-Beechview-01

    Snapdragons are popular garden flowers that originate in the Mediterranean region, where they grow as perennials. Here thay’re happy to grow as annuals, liberally seeding themselves and popping up in unlikely places. This one was part of a small colony growing from a little crack in the pavement at the edge of a street in Beechview, where it was happily blooming in early November. They can bloom till Christmas if there are no very hard freezes.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    ANTIRRHINUM [Tourn.] L. SNAPDRAGON
    Calyx 5-parted. Corolla-tube saccate or gibbous in front, not spurred; the lower lip 3-lobed, spreading, developed at the base into a prominent palate, which nearly or quite closes the throat; upper lip erect, shortly 2-lobed. Stamens 4, didynamous, included; anther-cells distinct and parallel. Ours herbaceous plants with lance-oblong to linear entire leaves and axillary or racemose flowers. (Name from anti, in the sense of like, and rhis, a snout, in reference doubtless to the peculiar form of the corolla.)

    A. MAJUS L. Perennial, glandular-pubescent and somewhat viscid; leaves lance-oblong; calyx-lobes ovate or oblong, short; corolla crimson, white, or variegated, 2-3 cm. long. Commonly cultivated, and occasionally found as an escape. (Introd. from Eu.)