A flower that rewards close examination for its fringed petals, the fringes growing like ice crystals on a pane of glass. It likes rich woods, especially in stream valleys; this plant grew in the Squaw Run valley, where it was blooming in late April.
Gray describes the genus and the species:
MITELLA [Tourn.] L. MITERWORT, BISHOP’S CAP
Calyx short, adherent to the base of the ovary, 6-cleft. Petals 5, slender. Stamens 5 or 10, included. Styles 2, very short. Capsule short, 2-beaked, 1-celled, with 2 parietal or rather basal several-seeded placentae, 2-valved at the
summit. Seeds smooth and shining. Low and slender perennials, with round heart-shaped alternate slender-petioled leaves on the rootstock or runners, and naked or 2-few-leaved flowering steins. Flowers small, in a simple slender raceme or spike. Fruit soon widely dehiscent. (Diminutive of mitra, a cap, alluding to the form of the young pod.)
1. M. diphylla L. Hairy; leaves heart-shaped, acute, somewhat 3-5-lobed, toothed, those on the many-flowered stem 2, opposite, nearly sessile, with interfoliar stipules ; flowers white, in a raceme (1.5-2 dm. long); stamens 10. Rich woods, Que. and N. E. to N. C., w. to Minn., Ia., and Mo. May.
Ash-Leaf Maple, or Box Elder, is the only maple in North America with compound leaves. The dangling flowers appear in early spring just as the leaves are beginning to show themselves.
This tree tends to take over hedges in the city, and perhaps the best way to deal with that is just to let it take over. The leaves often have three leaflets, making them easy to mistake for Poison Ivy. This tree grew at the edge of a little park in Beechview.
Gray describes the genus and the species:
ACER [Tourn.] L. MAPLE
Flowers polygamo-dioecious. Calyx colored, 5 (rarely 4-12)-lobed or -parted. Petals either none or as many as the lobes of the calyx, equal, with short claws if any, inserted on the margin of a perigynous or hypogynous disk. Stamens 3-12. Ovary 2-celled, with a pair of ovules in each cell; styles 2, long and slender, united only below, stigmatic down the inside. From the back of each carpel grows a wing, converting the fruit into two 1-seeded at length separable samaras or keys. Trees or sometimes shrubs, with opposite palmately lobed leaves, and small flowers. Pedicels not jointed. (The classical name, from the Celtic ac, hard.)
A. Negundo L. (BOX ELDER.) Leaflets 3-6 (-9), smoothish when old, very veiny, ovate, pointed, toothed; petals none; fruit smooth, with large rather incurved wings. (Negundo aceroides Moench.) River-banks, w. N. E. to Man., south w. and westw.; extensively cultivated and frequently seeding itself eastw. Apr. A small but handsome tree, with light-green twigs, and very delicate drooping clusters of small greenish flowers rather earlier than the leaves.
A common lawn weed that’s so tiny we usually overlook it. Up close, however, the sky-blue flowers are beautiful, and they are among the first wild flowers to appear in spring. This plant was blooming two days before the official beginning of spring in a lawn in Beechview.
UPDATE: A kind commenter (see below) identifies this plant as Trillium erectum, and further investigation convinces us that he was correct. We had previously identified it as Trillium cernuum, and we keep Gray’s description of that species in brackets below. We always receive these corrections and suggestions with profound gratitude.
Unlike the Great White Trillium, this species is a bit bashful. You have to stoop down to appreciate its nodding flowers. The most common color is a deep mahogany red, but in this patch of woods nearly every flower (of countless thousands) was white. This one was blooming at the beginning of May along the Trillium Trail in Fox Chapel. Another white Trillium erectum is here, and an unusual greenish-yellow form is here.
Gray describes the genus and the species:
TRILLIUM L. WAKE ROBIN. BIRTHROOT Sepals 3, lanceolate, spreading, herbaceous, persistent. Petals 3, larger, withering in age. Stamens 6; anthers linear, on short filaments, adnate. Styles awl-shaped or slender, spreading or recurved above, persistent, stigmatic down the inner side. Seeds ovate, horizontal, several in each cell. Low perennial herbs, with a stout and simple stem rising from a short and praemorse tuber-like rootstock, bearing at the summit a whorl of 3 ample, commonly broadly ovate, more or less ribbed but netted-veined leaves, and a terminal large flower; in spring. (Name from tres, three; all the parts being in threes.) Monstrosities are not rare with the calyx and sometimes petals changed to leaves, or the parts of the flower increased in number.
Ovary and fruit 6-angled and more or less winged.
Flower pediceled; connective narrow, not produced; leaves subsessile.
Anthers at anthesis exceeding the stigmas.
T. eréctum L. Leaves very broadly rhombic, shortly acuminate ; peduncle (2—8 cm. long) usually more or less inclined or declínate; petals ovate to lanceolate (18-36 mm. long), brown-purple or often white or greenish or pinkish; stamens exceeding the stout distinct spreading or recurved stigmas; ovary purple; fruit ovoid, 2.5 cm. long, reddish. — Rich woods, e. Que. to Ont., southw. to Pa. and in the mts, to N. C. — Flowers ill-scented.
[Trillium cernuum L. Leaves very broadly rhombic-ovate; peduncles (833 mm. long) usually recurved; petals white or pink, ovate- to oblong-lanceolate (12-24 mm. long), wavy, recurved-spreading; filaments nearly or quite equaling the anthers; ovary white or pinkish ; stigmas stoutish, tapering from the base to the apex; fruit ovoid. Moist woods, Nfd. to Man., southw. to Pa., Mich., Minn., and in the mts. to Ga.]
This ubiquitous European import grows almost anywhere the grass isn’t mowed too frequently. It keeps blooming throughout the season: this flower was going strong in early November in Beechview. It came to America as a pasture crop, and soon found that it really liked our open spaces.
Gray describes the genus and the species:
TRIFOLIUM [Tourn.] L. CLOVER. TREFOIL
Calyx persistent, 5-cleft, the teeth usually bristle-form. Corolla mostly withering or persistent; the claws of all the petals, or of all except the oblong or ovate standard, more or less united below with the stamen-tube; keel short and obtuse. Tenth stamen more or less separate. Pods small and membranous, often included in the calyx, 1-6-seeded, indehiscent, or opening by one of the sutures. Tufted or diffuse herbs. Leaves mostly palmately (sometimes pinnately) 3-foliolate; leaflets usually toothed. Stipules united with the petiole. Flowers in heads or spikes. (Name from tres, three, and folium, a leaf.)
T. PRATENSE L. (RED C.) Perennial; stems ascending, somewhat hairy; leaflets oval or obovate, often notched at the end and marked on the upper side with a pale spot; stipules broad, bristle-pointed; heads ovoid, sessile or not rarely pedunculate; corolla magenta to whitish; calyx soft-hairy. Fields and meadows; extensively cultivated. (Introd. from Eu.)
