Flora Pittsburghensis

Author: Father Pitt

  • Skunk Cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus)

    Skunk Cabbage is one of the earliest flowers to bloom; it can come out as early as February, before the leaves have appeared at all. The curious inflorescence at once marks it as a member of the Arum family, which also includes Jack-in-the-Pulpits, as well as the callas and anthuriums in florists’ shops. This plant was photographed in early April, by which time the leaves had emerged; they smell awful if you crush them. It likes wet ground, and this one was blooming in a muddy low spot next to the Squaw Run in Fox Chapel.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    SYMPLOCÁRPUS Salisb. SKUNK CABBAGE. Stamens 4, opposite the sepals, with at length rather slender filaments; anthers extrorse, 2-celled, opening lengthwise. Style 4-angled and awl-shaped; stigma small. Ovule solitary, suspended, anatropous. Fruit a globular or ovoid mass, composed of the enlarged and spongy spadix, inclosing the spherical seeds just beneath the surface, which is roughened with the persistent fleshy sepals and pyramidal styles.— Perennial herb, with a strong odor like that of the skunk, and also somewhat alliaceous; a very thick rootstock, and a cluster of very large and broad entire veiny leaves, preceded in earliest spring by the nearly sessile spathes, which barely rise out of the ground. (Name from symploke, connection, and karpos, fruit, in allusion to the coalescence of the ovaries into a compound fruit.)

    S. foétidus (L.) Nutt. Leaves ovate, cordate, becoming 3-6 dm. long, short-petioled; spathe spotted and striped with purple and yellowish-green, ovate, incurved. (Spathyema Raf.)—Bogs and moist grounds, N. S. to N. C, w. to Ont., Minn., and Ia.

  • Hairy Bittercress (Cardamine hirsuta)

    Depending on your point of view, this is either an invasive weed or a cheery harbinger of spring. It comes from Europe, and it makes itself at home in our lawns, where it politely refuses to exceed the height of the grass around it. There are people who eat it as a salad herb, so it can’t be all bad. It’s one of the first things to bloom in the spring, appearing along with the crocuses and persisting through daffodil season. This patch was blooming in a lawn in Beechview in early April.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    CARDÂMINE [Tourn.] L. Bitter Cress. Pod linear, flattened, usually opening elastically from the base; the valves nerveless and veinlees, or nearly so; placentae and partition thick. Seeds in a single row in each cell, wingless; the funiculus slender. Cotyledons accumbent, flattened, equal or nearly so, petiolate.— Mostly glabrous perennials, leafy-stemmed, growing along watercourses and in wet places. Flowers white or purple. (A Greek name, used by Dioscorides for some cress, from its cordial or cardiacal qualities.)

    Root mostly biennial or annual; leaves pinnately 5-11-foliolate, flowers small, white.

    Stamens 4; leaflets strigose-hispid upon the upper surface.

    С. hirsuta L. Leaves chiefly radical, with short and broad leaflets, but those on the erect stem reduced and with narrow leaflets; pods erect, on ascending or appressed pedicels. — Moist places, s. l’a. to N. C, and “Mich.” (Eu.) Perhaps introduced. A doubtful specimen from w. Mass. (Miss Vail).

  • Groundsel (Senecio vulgaris)

    This ubiquitous weed is found in temperate latitudes throughout the world. The tight little flower heads never open up any wider than what you see here. These plants, growing on a sunny and recently disturbed bank in Beechview, were among the very earliest flowers to bloom in the spring; this picture, in fact, was taken on March 20, the first day of spring.

    Gray’s description of the genus and species follows, but it does not describe the plants in the photograph very well. The on-line Flora of North America remarks that the plants may be “sparsely tomentose when young,” as these plants were. And although Gray gives “July-Sept” as the flowering period, the Flora of North America says “flowering early spring.” In fact these can also be seen very late in the fall, and almost any time in between. The plant blooms very quickly from seed, and seedlings can overwinter; and it seems to present very different habits depending on the time of year.

    SENECIO [Tourn.] L. Groundsel. Ragwort. Squaw-weed. Heads many-flowered; rays pistillate or none; involucre cylindrical to bellshaped, simple or with a few bractlets at the base, the bracts erect-connivent. Receptacle flat, naked. Pappus of numerous very soft and capillary bristles.— Ours herbs, with alternate leaves and solitary or corymbed heads. Flowers chiefly yellow. (Name from senex, an old man, alluding to the hoariness of many species, or to the white hairs of the pappus.)

    Annuals (rarely becoming biennial); stems leafy to the Inflorescence; heads medium-sized, 1 сш. or less high during anthesis.

    S. vulgàris L. (Common Groundsel.) Low annual, 1-6 dm. high. corymbosely branched, glabrate, leafy to the inflorescence; leaves pinnatifid and toothed, 1-8 cm. long, 0.6-3 cm. broad; calyculate bracts (bracteoles) of the involucre distinctly black-tipped; rays none; achenes hirtellous. — Waste grounds, common. July-Sept. (Nat. from Eu.)

  • Great Lobelia (Lobelia siphilitica)

    Sometimes called “Blue Cardinal Flower” because of its strong resemblance to its close relative the Cardinal Flower, L. cardinalis, with which this species apparently hybridizes. The unattractive species name comes from an old belief that it was a treatment for syphilis. The Plant Fact Sheet (PDF) from the Natural Resources Conservation Service adds that “The Meskwaki ground up the roots of this plant and used it as an anti-divorce remedy.” What America needs today is more ground-up Lobelia siphilitica roots.

    The flowers are variable in color: some are solid pale blue, some darker blue, and some—as here—strongly bicolored. A white form is found occasionally.

    Like the Cardinal Flower, this Lobelia likes damp situations; this one grew on the bank of a stream in Manor, where it was blooming in early October.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    LOBELIA [Plumier] L. Calyx 5-cleft, with a short tube. Corolla with a straight tube split down on the (apparently) upper side, somewhat 2-lipped; the upper lip of 2 rather erect lobes, the lower lip spreading and 3-cleft. Two of the anthers in our species bearded at the top. Pod 2-celled, many-seeded, opening at the top. — Flowers axillary or chiefly in bracted racemes ; in summer and early autumn. (Dedicated to Matthias de l’Obel, an early Flemish herbalist.)

    Flowers blue, or blue variegated with white.

    Flowers rather large (corolla-tube 1-1.3 cm. long), spicate-racemose; stem leafy, 0.3-1 m. high; perennial.

    Leaves ovate to lanceolate, numerous; lip of corolla glabrous.

    L. siphilitica L. (GREAT LOBELIA.) Somewhat hairy; leaves thin, acute at both ends, 0.5-1.5 dm. long, irregularly serrate; flowers nearly 2.6 cm. long, pediceled, longer than the leafy bracts; corolla light blue, rarely white; calyx hirsute, the sinuses with conspicuous deflexed auricles, the short tube hemispherical. — Low grounds, Me. to Ont. westw. and southw.; rare eastw.

  • Comfrey (Symphytum officinale)

    Beautiful purple flowers bear more than a passing resemblance to their cousins the Virginia Bluebells. Comfrey is a European import brought here as part of the herbalist’s basic tool kit. It was used to treat digestive problems, but it contains poisons that could kill you, though you might die with excellent digestion. It has also been used as an ointment for treating wounds, but applying it to broken skin can also get the poison into your system. So perhaps it’s best just to enjoy the beauty of the flowers, and leave medicine to the pill peddlers.

    Comfrey likes wet feet: this plant was growing beside a stream in Manor, Westmoreland County.

    Gray describes the genus and the species:

    SÝMPHYTUM [Tourn.] L. COMFREY. Corolla 5-toothed, the short teeth spreading. Stamens included; anthers elongated. Style thread-form. Nutlets erect, fixed by the large hollowed base, which is finely toothed on its margin. — Coarse perennial herbs, with thickened bitterish mucilaginous roots; the nodding raceme-like clusters either single or in pairs. (Ancient Greek name from symphyein, to cause to grow together, probably for its reputed healing virtues.)

    S. officinàle L. (COMMON C.) Hairy, branched; upper leaves deeurrent upon the stem in broad cuneate wings, the lower large, ovate or ovate-lanceolate; calyx-segments lance-linear; corolla yellowish- or pinkish-white to bluish- or roseate-purple; nutlets nearly smooth, somewhat shining. — Moist places, escaped from gardens. June, July. (Introd. from Eu.)