A shrub which usually climbs by means of rootlets over rocks, walls, and trees; sometimes low and erect. Leaves.—Divided into three somewhat four-sided pointed leaflets. Flowers.—Greenish or yellowish-white, small, some perfect, others unisexual; in loose clusters in the axils of the leaves in June. Fruit.—Small, globular, somewhat berry-like, dun-colored, clustered.
This much-dreaded plant is often confused with the beautiful Virginia creeper, occasionally to the ruthless destruction of the latter. Generally the two can be distinguished by the three-divided leaves of the poison ivy, the leaves of the Virginia creeper usually being five-divided. In the late year the whitish fruit of the ivy easily identifies it, the berries of the creeper being blackish. The poison ivy is reputed to be especially harmful during the night, or at any time in early summer when the sun is not shining upon it.
Virginia Creeper. American Ivy.
Ampelopsis quinquefolia. Vine Family.
A woody vine climbing by means of disk-bearing tendrils, and also by rootlets. Leaves.—Usually divided into five leaflets. Flowers.—Greenish, small, clustered, appearing in July. Fruit.—A small, blackish berry in October.
Surely in autumn, if not always, this is the most beautiful of our native climbers. At that season its blood-like sprays are outlined against the dark evergreens about which they delight to twine, showing that marvellous discrimination in background which so constantly excites our admiration in nature. The Virginia creeper is extensively cultivated in Europe. Even in Venice, that sea-city where one so little anticipates any reminders of home woods and meadows, many a dim canal mirrors in October some crumbling wall or graceful trellis aglow with its vivid beauty.
Shin-leaf.
Pyrola elliptica. Heath Family.
Scape.—Upright, scaly, terminating in a many-flowered raceme. Leaves.—From the root, thin and dull, somewhat oval. Flowers.—White, nodding. Calyx.—Five-parted. Corolla.—Of five rounded, concave petals. Stamens.—Ten. Pistil.—One, with a long curved style.
In the distance these pretty flowers suggest the lilies-of-the-valley. They are found in the woods of June and July, often in close company with the pipsissewa. The ugly common name of shin-leaf arose from an early custom of applying the leaves of this genus to bruises or sores; the English peasantry being in the habit of calling any kind of plaster a “shin-plaster” without regard to the part of the body to which it might be applied. The old herbalist, Salmon, says that the name Pyrola was given to the genus by the Romans on account of the fancied resemblance of its leaves and flowers to those of a pear-tree. The English also call the plant “wintergreen,” which name we usually reserve for Gaultheria procumbens.
P. rotundifolia is a species with thick, shining, rounded leaves.