Flora Pittsburghensis

Author: Father Pitt

  • Indian Hemp (Apocynum cannabinum)

    A tidy plant easily mistaken for a small shrub, especially when it grows a the edge of the woods with the rest of the undergrowth. It belongs to the same family that gives us our garden periwinkles. The red stem and smooth, elliptical leaves give the plant an elegant appearance, and the little flowers look as though they were made from the finest porcelain. The plant is poisonous, however; the name “dogbane” attaches itself to the whole family for good reason. This plant was growing by a tombstone in an overgrown cemetery in Beechview, where it was blooming in the middle of July.

    The distinctive long seedpods look a bit like string beans, as we see on another plant that grew by the edge of the woods in the same cemetery.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    APÓCYNUM [Tourn.] L. DOGBANE. INDIAN HEMP. Calyx-lobes acute. Corolla bell-shaped, bearing 5 triangular appendages below the throat opposite the lobes. Stamens on the very base of the corolla; filaments shorter than the arrow-shaped convergent anthers, which slightly adhere to the stigma. Style none; stigma large, ovoid, slightly 2-lobed. Fruit of 2 long and slender follicles. Seeds with a tuft of long silky down at the apex. — Perennial herbs, with upright branching stems, opposite mucronatepointcd leaves, a tough fibrous bark, and small and pale cymose flowers on short pedicels. (Ancient name of the Dogbane, composed of apo, from, and kyon, a dog.)

    * * Corolla greenish to greenish-white, tubular, pentagonal, 3-4.5 mm. long, the lobes ascending; cymes terminal, of mostly ascending flowers.

    A. cannábinum L. (INDIAN HEMP.) Glabrous, 2-24 dm. high, the stems and branches ascending (but on gravel beaches, etc., depressed and wide-spreading), leaves mostly ascending, usually pale green, ovate-oblong to lanceolate, glabrous or sparingly pubescent beneath, those of the chief axis narrowed at base to distinct petioles (2-7 mm. long), those of the branches often subsessüe: central cyme flowering first; flowers erect; calyx glabrous, its lobes about equaling the corolla, tube. — Gravelly or sandy soil, mostly near streams; on beaches becoming dwarfed and diffuse, with smaller and narrower leaves (A. album Greene). June-Aug.

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    In Wild Flowers East of the Rockies (1910), Chester Albert Reed does not share our opinion of the elegance of this plant; but he does give us a good description and some of the history of it:

    INDIAN HEMP (Apocynum cannabinum) is a rather unattractive species with a smooth branching stem, rising from vertical roots to heights of 1 to 4 feet. The ovate-pointed leaves are lusterless, have very short stems and are closely crowded on the stalk oppositely to one another.

    The small, five-parted, greenish-white flowers grow in terminal clusters. A tiny drop of nectar, secreted at the bottom of each small, shallow cup, furnishes food for quantities of insects, including a great many crawling ones that are of no value to the plant. The name of Indian Hemp has its origin because Indians formerly used the tough fibres as a substitute for hemp in their basket work. We find this species very abundant in dry fields and thickets throughout our range; it flowers from June to August.

  • Butterfly-Weed (Asclepias tuberosa)

    One of our brightest and most beloved wild flowers, and one of the very few bright orange flowers to decorate our roadsides. Butterfly-weed blooms at about the same time as the Daylily (Hemerocallis fulva), and if possible out-oranges it along our highways and byways. This is a favorite plant of the Monarch butterfly, itself bright orange to match its favorite flower. Rarely some plants will produce flowers in red or yellow, and breeders have produced a variety of domesticated colors in that range. But nothing matches the vivid orange of the wild version. It prefers a dry fallow field or a grassy bank in full sun. This plant grew in an open field near Export; it was a relatively late bloomer, flowering in the middle of July.

    Another English name, Pleurisy-Root, refers to an old use of the plant in folk medicine.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    ASCLEPIAS [Tourn.] L. MILKWEED, SILKWEED. Calyx persistent; divisions small, reflexed. Corolla deeply 5-parted; divisions valvate in bud, deciduous. Crown of 5 hooded bodies seated on the tube of stamens, each containing an incurved horn. Stamens 5, inserted on the base of the corolla; filaments united into a tube which incloses the pistil; anthers adherent to the stigma, each with 2 vertical cells, tipped with a membranaceous appendage, each cell containing a flattened pear-shaped and waxy pollen-mass; the two contiguous pollen-masses of adjacent anthers, forming pairs which hang by a slender prolongation of their summits from 5 cloven glands tbat grow on the angles of the stigma (extricated from the cells by insects, and directing copious pollen-tubes into the point where the stigma joins the apex of the style). Ovaries 2, tapering into very short styles; the large depressed 5-angled fleshy stigmatic disk common to the two. Follicles 2, one of them often abortive, soft, ovoid or lanceolate. Seeds anatropous, flat, margined, bearing a tuft of long silky hairs (coma) at the hilum, downwardly imbricated all over the large placenta, which separates from the suture at maturity. Embryo large, with broad foliaceous cotyledons in thin albumen. Perennial herbs; peduncles terminal or lateral and between the usually opposite petioles, bearing simple many-flowered umbels, in summer. (The Greek name of Aesculapius, to whom the genus is dedicated.)

    § 1. Anther-wings broadest and usually angulate-truncate and salient at base; horn conspicuous.

    • Flowers orange-color; leaves mostly scattered; juice not milky.

    A. tuberosa L. (BUTTERFLY-WEED, PLEURISY-ROOT.) Roughish-hairy, 3-9 dm. high; stems ascending or decumbent, very leafy, branching at tie summit, and bearing umbels in a terminal corymb, or scattered in racemes along the branches; leaves from linear to oblong-ovate, sessile or slightly petioled; divisions of the corolla oblong, greenish-orange; hoods narrowly oblong, bright orange, scarcely longer than the nearly erect and slender awl-shaped horns; pods hoary, erect on deflexed pedicels. (Including A. decumbens L.) — Dry fields and banks, N. H. to Ont., Minn., southw. and southwestw. June-Aug.

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

    BUTTERFLY-WEED; PLEURISY-ROOT; ORANGE MILK-WEED (Asclepias tuberosa) is the most brilliantly colored species of the genus. Even those accustomed to the sight of this plant cannot suppress the feeling of admiration that stirs them as they suddenly behold the vivid, orange flashes greeting them as they cross waste or dry fields.

    The stem of butterfly-weed is usually erect, from 1 to 3 feet high; it is rather rough and has but little of the milky juices so common to the other species. The leaves are pointed-oblong, very short-stemmed or seated oppositely. The beautiful orange flowers grow in flat-topped clusters or umbels, at the summit of the plant. It is found from Mass, to Minn, and southwards, most abundant in the Southern States. Its roots are used medicinally.

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  • Burdock (Arctium minus)

    This common weed often grows in vacant lots. The flowers are usually purple or pink, but a rare white form sometimes occurs.

    American Italians call this plant cardone, or cardoon if you like a more Anglicized term, a valuable free vegetable whose stalks many Italian families gather in great quantities. The European Cardoon is a different plant, but it seems that the Burdock makes a good substitute. In Japan, the root is eaten as gobo. The next time you see a vacant lot filled with burdock, remember that you are seeing nothing less than a smorgasbord of free appetizers.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    ARCTIUM L. BURDOCK. Heads many-flowered; flowers all tubular, perfect, similar. Involucre globular; the imbricated bracts coriaceous and appressed at base, attenuate to long stiff points with hooked tips. Receptacle bristly. Achenes oblong, flattened, wrinkled transversely; pappus short, of numerous rough bristles, separate and deciduous. — Coarse biennial weeds, with large unarmed petioled roundish or ovate mostly cordate leaves floccose-tomentose beneath, and small solitary or clustered heads; flowers purple, rarely white. (Name probably from arktos, a bear, from the rough involucre.)

    A. minus Bernh. (COMMON B.) Heads racemose or subracemose, 1.5-3 tm. broad; involucre glabrous or arachnoid; bracts shorter, more slender and more arcuate than in the preceding. (A. Lappa, var. Gray.) — Roadsides and waste places, too common throughout our range except on the northeastern borders where largely replaced by the preceding [A. lappa]. — Including A. Lappa, var. tomentosum Gray, a form differing only in its more or less arachnoid involucre, and apparently less marked or characteristic than the European A. tomentosum Mill. (Nat. from Eu.)

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    In Wild Flowers East of the Rockies (1910), Chester Albert Reed gives us a good description of this plant and its life:

    BURDOCK (Arctium minus) (EUROPEAN) is a very common plant on waste ground, along roadsides and the edges of woods. The plant is often four feet or more high. The lower leaves are very large, often more than a foot in length, heart-shaped, deep green and finely veined above, greyish beneath because of the fine wool that covers the under surfaces. The upper leaves are smaller, more ovate in form and less densely woolly on the undersides. The flowerheads grow in clusters at the ends of the branches. The involucre is almost spherical,—composed of numerous bracts, each terminating in a sharp, hooked point. Tubular florets, only, are seated within this involucre; they are purple and white in color, and secrete an abundance of nectar, on which account they are frequented by honey bees.

    We have seen how the Milkweed attaches to each of its seeds, a little parachute so it may fly away on the winds and found new colonies at a distance from the parent plants. We have also seen how the Beggar-tick and members of the Genus (Bidens) disperse their seeds by attaching them to the hair of animals or the clothing of man. The present species adopts the policy of the Beggar-ticks, but instead of single seeds, it attaches the whole bur-like head by means of its numerous little hooks. They cling tenaciously to everything they touch; doubtless most of my readers recall massing these burs together to make castles, funny men, animals, etc.

    We have two species of this plant,—the present, and one slightly larger and with coarser leaves, (A. Lappa). Both of them are immigrants from across the water.

  • Burdock (Arctium minus), White Form

    In our continuing quest to bring you flowers blooming in the wrong colors (see our purple Queen Anne’s Lace, white Deptford Pink, lavender Bugles, and white New England Aster) we bring you a rare white burdock—rare in general, but rather common in the Pittsburgh neighborhood of Beechview. Normally the florets of Burdock are in the pink to purple range; this white form was growing out of a hedge in Beechview, where it was blooming in the middle of July.

    To Italians this common weed is known as cardone, or cardoon if you like a more Anglicized term, a valuable free vegetable whose stalks many Italian families gather in great quantities. The European Cardoon is a different plant, but it seems that the Burdock makes a good substitute. In Japan, the root is eaten as gobo. The next time you see a vacant lot filled with burdock, remember that you are seeing nothing less than a smorgasbord of free appetizers.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    ARCTIUM L. BURDOCK. Heads many-flowered; flowers all tubular, perfect, similar. Involucre globular; the imbricated bracts coriaceous and appressed at base, attenuate to long stiff points with hooked tips. Receptacle bristly. Achenes oblong, flattened, wrinkled transversely; pappus short, of numerous rough bristles, separate and deciduous. — Coarse biennial weeds, with large unarmed petioled roundish or ovate mostly cordate leaves floccose-tomentose beneath, and small solitary or clustered heads; flowers purple, rarely white. (Name probably from arktos, a bear, from the rough involucre.)

    A. minus Bernh. (COMMON B.) Heads racemose or subracemose, 1.5-3 tm. broad; involucre glabrous or arachnoid; bracts shorter, more slender and more arcuate than in the preceding. (A. Lappa, var. Gray.) — Roadsides and waste places, too common throughout our range except on the northeastern borders where largely replaced by the preceding [A. lappa]. — Including A. Lappa, var. tomentosum Gray, a form differing only in its more or less arachnoid involucre, and apparently less marked or characteristic than the European A. tomentosum Mill. (Nat. from Eu.)

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    In Wild Flowers Every Child Should Know (1914), Frederic William Stack gives us a number of other common names for the plant, and a good bit of its popular lore:

    BURDOCK. COCKLE BUR. BEGGAR’S BUTTON. CUCKOO BUTTON

    Arctium minus. Thistle Family.

    Children delight to gather the shaggy green burs of the Beggar’s Button and form them into birds’ nests, baskets, dolls, and a various assortment of similar playthings. They well know, too, the bitter taste they leave on the fingers. The Burdock is a large, coarse, bushy, branching biennial, growing from two to four feet high. The large, rough stalk is very leafy, and is round and grooved. The toothless, hollow-stemmed leaves are large, broad, and alternating. They are pointed-oval in shape, more or less wavy, and rather thin and veiny. The lower ones are heart-shaped. The small flower head is composed of numerous silky, tubular florets of varying shades of purple, gathered into soft tufts and set in a rather large, conical green bur, which is thickly covered with many sharp, spreading, long-hooked, and sticky bristles. They are set on short stems in irregular terminal, bunchy clusters. The root and fresh leaves are employed as a remedy in blood and skin disorders, and also for swellings and rheumatism. In Japan the root is known as Gobo, and is a popular vegetable in the country. Burdock is a familiar plant commonly found around neglected buildings, and along fence rows, roadways, and in pastures patches along streams and in swamps, and flowering from May to July. The flower stem resembles the leaves, but is larger, and from one side, near the middle, it sends out a thick, fleshy, tapering spike, which is densely crowded with minute, greenish yellow florets. This spike is tender and edible when about half developed. The root which has a strong, aromatic fragrance, is used by country people when dried or candied, as a remedy for dyspepsia, and as a stimulant and tonic for feeble digestion. Calamus appears to have been known to the ancient Babylonians, and also by the Greeks. It is used in India to some extent, and the powdered root is an esteemed insecticide in Ceylon and India. It also produces a volatile oil that is largely used in perfumery. Calamus can always be identified by the fragrance emitted by the roots, and for edible purposes similar roots should be avoided. The interior of the stalk is sweet. It ranges from Nova Scotia to Ontario and Minnesota, south to Kansas and the Gulf of Mexico. Also in Europe and Asia. This species grows from two to six feet high.

  • Queen Anne’s Lace (Daucus carota), Purple Form

    There is hardly a more ubiquitous or a more elegantly constructed wild flower than Queen Anne’s Lace, which decorates our roadsides for miles on end. Besides the usual white form, a purple form shows up every once in a great while. This one was blooming against a tombstone in an old cemetery in Beechview. Up close, we can see that each tiny flower is an exquisite bicolor, white with purple petals.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    DAÚCUS [Tourn.] L. CARROT. Fruit oblong, flattened dorsally; stylopodium depressed; carpel with 5 slender bristly primary ribs and 4 winged secondary ones, each of the latter bearing a single row of barbed prickles; oil-tubes solitary under the secondary ribs, two on the commissural side. — Bristly annuals or biennials, with pinnately decompound leaves, foliaceous and cleft involucral bracts, and compound umbels which become strongly concave. (The ancient Greek name.)

    D. caròta L. Biennial; stem bristly; ultimate leaf-segments lanceolate and cuspidate; rays numerous. — Fields and waste places; a pernicious weed. — The flowers vary from white to roseate or pale yellow, the central one in each umbel usually dark purple. (Nat. from Eu.)

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    Mrs. Dana (in How to Know the Wild Flowers) gives us a diffuse and engaging description of this common weed:

    WILD CARROT. BIRD’S NEST. QUEEN ANNE’S LACE.

    Daucus Carota. Parsley Family.

    Stems.—Tall and slender. Leaves.—Finely dissected. Flowers.— White ; in a compound umbel, forming a circular flat-topped cluster.

    When the delicate flowers of the wild carrot are still unsoiled by the dust from the highway, and fresh from the early summer rains, they are very beautiful, adding much to the appearance of the roadsides and fields along which they grow so abundantly as to strike despair into the heart of the farmer, for this is, perhaps, the “peskiest” of all the weeds with which he has to contend. As time goes on the blossoms begin to have a careworn look and lose something of the cobwebby aspect which won them the title of Queen Anne’s lace. In late summer the flower-stalks erect themselves, forming a concave cluster which has the appearance of a bird’s nest. I have read that a species of bee makes use of this ready-made home, but have never seen any indications of such an occupancy.

    This is believed to be the stock from which the garden carrot was raised. The vegetable was well known to the ancients, and we learn from Pliny that the finest specimens were brought to Rome from Candia. When it was first introduced into Great Britain is not known, although the supposition is that it was brought over by the Dutch during the reign of Elizabeth. In the writings of Parkinson we read that the ladies wore carrot-leaves in their hair in place of feathers. One can picture the dejected appearance of a ball-room belle at the close of an entertainment.