Flora Pittsburghensis

Author: Father Pitt

  • Thin-Leaved Coneflower (Rudbeckia triloba)

    Very similar to its cousin the Black-Eyed Susan (R. hirta), but note the branching habit and the smaller flower heads with shorter, rounder rays. These plants grew in a sunny meadow in Sewickley Heights, where they were blooming in late August.

    Flowers. Heads with large, conical or hemispherical brown disk; about 8 short, elliptical golden rays.

    Leaves. Rough; upper sessile, with shallow teeth, ovate, pointed; lower often with 3 irregular lobes.

    Stem. Rough-hairy, purple; frequently branching; about 3 feet (1 m) high.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    RUDBÉCKIA L. CONE-FLOWER. Heads many-flowered, radiate; the rays neutral. Bracts of the involucre leaf-like, in about 2 rows, spreading. Receptacle conical or column ir ; the short chaff concave, not rigid. Achenes 4-angled (in our species), smooth, not margined, flat at the top, with no pappus, or a minute crown-like border. — Chiefly perennial herbs, with alternate leaves, and showy terminal heads; the rays generally long, yellow, often darker at base. (Named in honor of the Professors Rudbeck, father and son, predecessors of Linnaeus at Upsal.)

    Achenes annular; chaff persisting in age.

    Disk hemispherical to ellipsoid-ovoid in fruit, dark purple or brown.

    Lower leaves 3-lobed or parted.

    R. triloba L. Hairy, biennial, much branched, 0.5-1.6 m. high; branches slender and spreading; upper leaves ovate-lanceolate, sparingly toothed; lower 3-lobed, tapering at base, ooarsely serrate (those from the base pinnately parted or undivided); rays 8-10, oval or oblong; chaff of the black-purple depressed-globular disk smooth, awned. — Rich soil, N. J. to Minn., Kan., and southw.; escaped from cultivation further northeastw. July, Aug. — Heads small, but numerous and showy.

  • Field Milkwort (Polygala sanguinea)

    In a meadow full of grasses and wild flowers, this little gem is easily mistaken for a clover and passed by. A closer look reveals that the resemblance is merely superficial: the structure of the individual flowers is quite different, and the leaves are simple and linear. The flowers are deep pink or purple, fading to creamy greenish as they age, making the whole head delightfully artistic. These plants grew in a sunny meadow in Sewickley Heights, where they were blooming in late August.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    POLYGALA [Tourn.] L. MILKWORT. Flower very irregular. Calyx persistent, of 5 sepals, of which 8 (the uppermost and the 2 lowest) are small and often greenish, while the two lateral or inner (called wings) are much larger and colored like the petals. Petals 3, hypogynous, connected with each other and with the stamen-tube, the middle (lower) one keel-shaped and often crested on the back. Stamens 6 or 8; their filaments united below into a split sheath, or into 2 sets, cohering more or less with the petals, free above; anthers 1-celled. Ovary 2-celled, with an anatropous ovule pendulous in each cell; style prolonged and curved; stigma various. Fruit a small loculicidal 2-seeded pod, usually rounded and notched at the apex, much flattened contrary to the very narrow partition. Seeds carunculate. Embryo large, straight, with flat and broad cotyledons, in scanty albumen. — Bitter plants (low herbs in temperate regions), with simple entire often dotted leaves, and no stipules. (An old name composed of polys, much, and gala, milk, applied by Dioscorides to some low shrub reputed to increase lactation.)

    Annuals, with all the leaves alternate; flowers in terminal spikes, heads, or racemes, chiefly purple or rose-color, in summer; none subterranean.

    Keel minutely or inconspicuously crested; the true petals not longer but mostly shorter than the wings; seed pear-shaped.

    P. sanguínea L. Stem sparingly branched above, leafy to the top; leaves oblong-linear; heads globular, at length oblong, very dense (8-10 mm. thick), bright red-purple (rarely paler or even white); pedicels scarcely any; wings broadly ovate, closely sessile, longer than the pod; the 2-parted caruncle almost equaling the seed. (P. viridescens L.) — Sandy and moist ground; common, N. E., westw. and southw.

    –

    In his Wild Flowers East of the Rockies (1910), Chester Albert Reed gives us this description:

    FIELD or PURPLE MILKWORT (Polygala sanguinea) is a sturdy little pink-headed plant that grows in fields or meadows or along roadsides, often in company with Hop Clover; it is a strange fact that the flower heads of these very different species should be shaped so nearly alike. The slender, erect, wiry stems are very leafy and slightly branched at the top. A single round or cylindrical flowerhead terminates each branch, and others may be on slender peduncles from the angles of the upper leaves.

    The flowers, proper, are concealed beneath the large, broad, scale-like, crimson-pink sepals that tightly overlap each other and form the head; these scalelike sepals correspond to the wings on the Fringed Polygala, the true petals and minutely crested keel being shorter and not visible from the outside. The small, stiff, acutely-pointed leaves are densely alternated on the stem up to the flower head. The plant grows from 6 to 12 inches high, and abounds throughout the U. S.

  • Flowering Spurge (Euphorbia corollata)

    A relative of the Christmas Poinsettia and Snow-on-the-Mountain, this plant easily fools us into thinking it has regular five-petaled flowers like a pink or a buttercup. Structurally, however, the apparent petals are actually bracts that surround a cluster of tiny flowers. Doubtless there is a moral lesson to be learned here, but we have not learned it yet. These plants grew in a sunny meadow in Sewickley Heights, where they were blooming in late August.

    Flowers. Numerous; tiny and insignificant, but surrounded by five showy white regular bracts that look like petals; in irregular flattish umbels.

    Leaves. Oblong-linear; blunt; entire; smooth; lower leaves more elliptical; alternate, but whorled at the base of the umbel of flowers.

    Stem. Smooth; purplish; unbranched up to the whorl of leaves at the base of the umbel; about 3 feet (1 m) high.

    The genus Euphorbia is enormous, so Gray helpfully divides it into sections. Here he describes the genus, the section, and the species:

    EUPHÓRBIA L. SPURGE. Flowers monoecious, included in a cup-shaped 4-6-lobed involucre (flower of older authors) resembling a calyx or corolla, and usually bearing large thick glands (with or without petal-like margins) at its sinuses. Sterile flowers numerous and lining the base of the involucre, each from the axil of a little bract, and consisting merely ol a single stamen Jointed on a pedicel like the filament; anther-cells globular, separate. Fertile flower solitary in the middle of the involucre, soon protruded on a long pedicel, consisting of a 3-lobed and 3-celled ovary with no calyx (or a mere vestige). Styles 3, each 2-cleft; the stigmas therefore 6. Pod separating into three 1-seeded carpels, which split, plastically into 2 valves. Seed often caruncled (ours only in §§ 5 and 6). — Plants (ours essentially herbaceous) with a milky acrid juice. Peduncles terminal, often umbellate-clustered; in the first section mostly appearing lateral, but not really axillary. (Named for Euphorbus, physician to King Juba.)

    § 4. TITHYMALÓPSIS (Klotzsch &. Garcke) Boiss. Only the uppermost leaves whorled or opposite; erect perennials, with entire leaves equal at base; stipules none; involucres mostly 5-lobed, in the forks of the branches and terminal¡ inflorescence umbelliform.

    E. corollàta L. (FLOWERING S.) Glabrous or sometimes sparingly hairy, 4-10 dm. high; root deep; stem usually simple for more than half its length; leaves ovate, lanceolate, or linear, entire, obtuse; umbel 5(3-7)-forked, and the forks again 2-3(or rarely 5)-forked; involucres long-peduncled, with showy white appendages (appearing like petals), the lobes minute and incurved; pod slender-pediceled, smooth; seeds thick, 2 mm. long or more, ash-colored, slightly uneven. — Rich or sandy soil, N. Y. to Fla., w. to Minn, and La.; also locally naturalized in N. E. July-Oct.

  • Green-Headed Coneflower (Rudbeckia laciniata)

    These giant cousins of the Black-Eyed Susan (R. hirta) can grow twice the height of a man if they put their minds to it. They are magnificent and unmistakable in at least two important ways:

    1. The flower heads, with green disk florets and pale yellow somewhat reflexed rays.

    2. The lower leaves, which are large, deeply divided, and attached to the stem on broad winged petioles.

    The flowers above were growing along a gravel road through the woods near Cranberry; the ones to the right were growing in the woods at the edge of a cemetery near Export. Both were blooming in late August.

    Note that Gray’s description below puts the height at 2 m at most, but other sources mention that this species can grow up to 12 ft. (about 4 m), and the plants in the photograph at right were at least 9 ft. (3 m) tall.

    RUDBECKIA L. CONE-FLOWER. Heads many-flowered, radiate ; the rays neutral. Bracts of the involucre leaf-like, in about 2 rows, spreading. Receptacle conical or column ir ; the short chaff concave, not rigid. Achenes 4-angled (in our species), smooth, not margined, flat at the top, with no pappus, or a minute crown-like border. — Chiefly perennial herbs, with alternate leaves, and showy terminal heads; the rays generally long, yellow, often darker at base. (Named in honor of the Professors Rudbeck, father and son, predecessors of Linnaeus at Upsal.)

    Achenes annular; chaff persisting in age.

    Disk columnar in fruit, dull greenish-yellow.

    Leaves divided or cut.

    R. laciniàta L. Stem smooth, branching, 0.5-2 m. high; leaves smooth or roughish, the lowest pinnate, witli 5-7-cut or 3-lobed leaflets ; upper leaves irregularly 3-5-parted, their lohes ovate-lanceolate, pointed, or the uppermost undivided ; heads long-pedunclod ; disk at first globular or hemispherical ; chaff truncate, downy at tip ; rays oblanceolate, 3-5 cm. long, drooping. — Low thickets, w. Me. and w. Que., westw. and southw. July-Sept.

  • Jerusalem Artichoke (Helianthus tuberosus)

    Every botanical writer feels compelled to mention that this species is neither an artichoke nor from Jerusalem. One wonders whether anyone in the modern age has ever made that mistake. This is quite obviously a sunflower, though one more noted for its edible tuber than for its seeds. The flowers are delightful, to butterflies as well as to humans. The plant is very similar to Thin-Leaved Sunflower (H. decapetalus), but note the more robust leaves, hairy stem, and shorter bracts.

    Flowers. Heads terminal on branching stalks. Disk flowers golden; rays (about 13) golden, darkening to pale orange toward center. Bracts about as long as the disk.

    Leaves. Very rough; mid-green above, paler below; upper nearly sessile, lower on short petioles with tapering wings; mostly opposite, but upper alternate; upper nearly entire, lower with shallow teeth.

    Stem. Narrow but very strong; purple most of its length; very hairy; branching, especially toward ends.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    HELIÁNTHUS 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 chafly scales on the principal angles, and sometimes 2 or more small intermediate scales. — Coarse and stout herbs, with solitary or corymbcd heads, and yellow rays; flowering toward autumn. (Named from helios, the sun, and anthos, a flower.)

    §2. Perennials; receptacle convex or at length low-conical; lower leaves usually opposite.

    Involucre looser, the bracts more acuminate or elongated or foliaceous.

    Leaves all or most of them opposite, 3-nerved.

    Leaves longer-petiolate, thinnish or soft, coarsely serrate, commonly broad; bracts loose, hirsute-ciliate.

    H. tuberosus L. (JERUSALEM ARTICHOKE.) Pubescent or hirsute, 1.5-3.5 m. high; leaves ovate or subcordate to oblong-lanceolate, acuminate, scabrous above, minutely pubescent or cinereous beneath; bracts lanceolate, attenuate, little exceeding the disk; rays 12-20.—N. Y. to Minn., westw. and southw.; often cultivated, and introduced eastw.

    –

    In his Wild Flowers of New York (1914), Chester Albert Reed gives us some of the lore of this beautiful sunflower:

    This is an interesting native plant  often known as the Wild Sunflower. Indians and early colonists used its tuberous roots much as we use potatoes today. It was also carried abroad and cultivated extensively, particularly in Italy, where it was known as Girasole Articocco (Sunflower Artichoke), from which name it was corrupted into the Jerusalem Artichoke as we know it now. The stalk, which grows from six to twelve feet in height is very rough and the three-ribbed, toothed-edged leaves, the lower ones of which are set oppositely on the stalk, are also rough,—this roughness presumably being to discourage crawling insects from reaching the summit. The several flower heads are two or three inches across and consist of from a dozen to twenty rays about a greenish-yellow center. This species naturally grows in somewhat moist thickets but is often seen in or about old gardens where it continues to grow as a reminder of the days when it was cultivated for food.