Flora Pittsburghensis

Category: Caprifoliaceae

  • Japanese Snowball (Viburnum plicatum)

    Japanese Snowball (Viburnum plicatum)
    Photographed May 2.

    This spectacular bush comes in two varieties. The one that has become common in our woods is the fertile one, for obvious reasons, where the small inner flowers are surrounded by showy sterile flowers that attract the pollinators. In that form the plant is commonly called “Doublefile Viburnum.” Every so often, though, a plant pops up that has all sterile flowers, which form these white snowballs. These plants were blooming along the Trillium Trail in Fox Chapel, where the standard fertile form is very common.

    Japanese Snowball (Viburnum plicatum)

    Oddly, European botanists encountered this form of the plant first, so it was given the species name Viburnum plicatum, and the normal fertile form was called Viburnum plicatum var. tomentosum. We still see that variety name used often to describe the Doublefile Viburnum.

    Japanese Snowball (Viburnum plicatum)
    Japanese Snowball (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Viburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    The usual fertile form, with small fertile flowers surrounded by large sterile flowers.

  • Doublefile Viburnum (Viburnum plicatum)

    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Photographed April 24.

    An ornamental bush from Japan that has escaped and made itself at home in our area. These plants were blooming in the Kane Woods Nature Area, where the showy drifts of white flowers punctuate the woods in the spring. There are two kinds of flowers: the little ones in the middle that actually do the work, and the sterile flowers around the edge of the corymb that act as the plant’s advertising agency, bringing in potential pollinators.

    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)

    Once in a while, a plant bears all sterile flowers, which form a white ball that gives that form of the bush the name Japanese Snowball.

    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
    Doublefile Virburnum (Viburnum plicatum)
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  • Japanese Honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica)

    Lonicera japonica
    Photographed September 24 with a Konica Minolta DiMAGE Z6.

    Japanese Honeysuckle often puts on a second burst of bloom in early fall. These vines were blooming along the Montour Trail in Moon Township.

    For more pictures and a description, see the Lonicera japonica reference page.

  • Tartarian Honeysuckle (Lonicera tatarica)

    KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

    A noxious weed in many places, but rather uncommon here so far, especially compared to the ubiquitous Morrow’s Honeysuckle (Lonicera morrowi). The pink flowers of this species are distinctive, although it may also produce white flowers, in which case it may be much harder to tell from Morrow’s. This bush was growing just above the lake in Schenley Park, where it was blooming in early May.

    Gray describes the genus and the species which he places in the section Xylosteon:

    LONICERA L. HONEYSUCKLE. Calyx-teeth very short. Corolla tubular or funnel-form, often gibbous at the base, irregularly or almost regularly б-lobed. Berry several-seeded. — Erect or climbing shrubs. Leaves entire. Flowers often showy and fragrant. (Named in honor of Adam Lonitzer, latinized Lonicerus, a German herbalist of the 16th century.) A large boreal genus most abundant in Asia and long popular in cultivation.

    XYLÓSTEON [Tourn.] Pers. Leaves all distinct; peduncles axillary, single, 2-flowered at the summit; the two berries sometimes united into one; calyx-teeth not persistent.

    Upright bushy shrubs.

    Bracts (2 or sometimes 4) at the base of the ovaries small, lance-oblong to linear.

    Corolla-lobes subequal.

    Peduncles long and slender (1.4-3 cm. in length).

    L. tatarica L. (TARTARIAN H.) Smooth shrub, 1.6-3 m. high ; leaves thin, glabrous, entire, cordate-oval, on short petioles ; corolla showy, white or rose-colored; the lobes subequal, widely spreading, nearly as long as the tube; berries united at the base, red or orange. — Escaped from cultivation and estab lished on rocky shores and sheltered banks, Me. to Ont., N. J., and Ky. May, June. (Introd. from Asia.)

  • Highbush Cranberry (Viburnum trilobum)

    Not really a cranberry, but it has berries that can be a good substitute for cranberries. The leaves are much like the leaves of Red Maple (Acer rubrum), and the flowers come in dense cymes. Most of the flowers are tiny, but the outer flowers in each cyme, which are sterile, are immensely overgrown, making the whole cyme much more showy and a much more attractive target for pollinators. This bush was growing at the edge of the woods in Harmarville, where it was blooming in late May.

    This species is often considered as variety americanum of the Eurasian species V. opulus, and so Gray classifies it:

    VIBÚRNUM [Tourn.] L. ARROW-WOOD, LAURESTINUS. Calyx 5-toothed. Corolla spreading, deeply 5-lobed. Stamens 5. Stigmas 1-3. Fruit a 1-celled 1-seeded drupe, with soft pulp and a thin-crustaceous (flattened or tumid) stone. —Shrubs, with simple leaves, and white (rarely pink) flowers in flat compound cymes. Petioles sometimes bearing little appendages which are evidently stipules. Leaf-buds naked, or with a pair of scales. (The classical Latin name, of unknown meaning.)

    § 2. ÓPULUS [T onrn.] DC. Winter-buds scaly; leaves palmately veined and lobed; drupe bright red, acid, globose; stone very flat, orbicular, not sulcate.

    V. Ópulus L., var. americànum (Mill.) Ait. (CRANBERRY-TREE, HIGH-BUSH CRANBERRY, PIMBINA.) Nearly smooth, upright, 1-4 m. high; leaves 3-5-ribbed, strongly 3-lobed, broadly wedge-shaped or truncate at base, the spreading lobes pointed, mostly toothed on the sides, entire in the sinuses; petioles bearing 2 glands at the apex; cyme broad, the marginal flowers neutral, with greatly enlarged flat corollas; stamens elongate. (V. americanum Mill.) — In woods and along streams, Nfd. and e. Que. to B. C, s. to N. J., Pa., Mich., Wisc., and n. e. Ia. June, July. (E. Asia.) — The acid fruit of this and the next is a substitute for cranberries. The well-known Snow-ball Tree, or Guelder Rose, is a cultivated state of the typical Old World form, with the whole cyme turned into showy sterile flowers.