SNOW-PLANT.
Sarcodes sanguinea, Torr. Heath Family.
Fleshy, glandular-pubescent plants; six inches to over a foot high; bright red; without green foliage; having, in place of leaves, fleshy scales, with glandular-ciliate margins. Flowers.—Short-pediceled. Sepals.—Five. Corolla.—Six lines long; campanulate; with five-lobed limb. Stamens.—Ten. Anthers two-celled; opening terminally. Ovary.—Five-celled; globose. Style stout. Stigma capitate. Hab.—Throughout the Sierras, from four to nine thousand feet elevation.
I shall never forget finding my first snow-plant. It was upon a perfect August day in the Sierras. Following the course of a little rill which wound among mosses and ferns through the open forest where noble fir shafts rose on every hand, I came unexpectedly upon this scarlet miracle, standing in the rich, black mold in a sheltered nook in the wood. A single ray of strong sunlight shone upon it, leaving the wood around it dark, so that it stood out like a single figure in a tableau vivant. There was something so personal, so glowing, and so lifelike about it, that I almost fancied I could see the warm life-blood pulsing and quivering through it. I knelt to examine it. In lieu of leaves, the plant was supplied with many overlapping scalelike bracts of a flesh-tint. These were quite rigid below and closely appressed to the stem, but above they became looser and curled gracefully about among the vivid red bells.
I had heard that the plant was a root parasite; so it was with much interest and great care I dug about it with my trowel. But I failed to find its root connected with any other. I have since learned that it is now considered one of those plants akin to the fungi, which in some mysterious way draw their nourishment from decaying or decomposing matter.
I carried my prize home, where it retained its beauty for a number of days. I afterward found many of them. They gradually follow the receding snows up the heights; so that late in the season one must climb for them.
[SNOW-PLANT—Sarcodes sanguinea.]
![[SNOW-PLANT—Sarcodes sanguinea.]](#3624944100741987669_f142.png.id-6648680348424003046.wrap-0.html.html){kind=link}
The name "snow-plant" is very misleading, because from it one naturally expects to find the plant growing upon the snow. But this is rarely or never the case, for it is after the melting of the snow that it pushes its way aboveground.
Late in the season the plant usually has one or more well-formed young plants underground at its base. These are all ready to come forth the next season at the first intimation that the snow has gone, which easily accounts for its marvelously rapid growth. By the end of August, the seed-vessels are well developed, and as large as a small marble, but flattened; and by that time the plants have lost their brilliant coloring, and become dull and faded.
It is said that the stems have been boiled and eaten, and found quite palatable; but this would seem to the lover of the beautiful like eating the showbread from the ark of Nature's tabernacle.