Plants and their children

by Frances Theodora Parsons

The first plant to blossom knows better than to proclaim the change of season by anything so fragile as a violet, an anemone, a spring beauty. It sends out its rather coarse little flowers under the protection of a tough waterproof hood, which shields them from the rude winds and nipping cold.

This plant bears the ugly name of skunk cabbage (Fig. [196]). Its broken stem and leaves give out an odor which at once persuades you that its title is deserved.

Fig. 196

In the swamps the skunk cabbages send up by the dozen the curious purple hoods which curl about the thick clusters of little flowers. When you come across a colony of these queer-looking objects, no wonder it never occurs to you that the first flower of spring is at hand. The great shiny hoods look more like snails than like flowers; and indeed usually the flowers are not in sight at all, so well are they shielded by these hood-like leaves.

But each little hidden flower has four flower leaves, four stamens, and one pistil. When they have been dusted with pollen by fly visitors, and are preparing to turn into fruit, the purple hoods wither away. Then the plant sends up clusters of large bright green leaves. In June you see these great leaves everywhere in the wet woods.

So if you wish to be on hand to welcome the very first flower of the year, you must begin to keep your eyes open by the end of February. You must visit the swamps each day, and look for the purple hoods inside which are snugly hidden the little blossoms of the skunk cabbage.

And I advise you now to take a sheet of paper and make a list of the plants as you find them in flower. Put down the date of each blossom as it appears, and the place where you find it. If you begin to do this as children, and keep it up when you are older, you will take real delight in the habit. Each year it will interest you more and more to turn back to the old lists and discover whether the flowers are on time, or whether they are late or early in making their first appearance.

I hope your teacher will start you at once with such a list; for the sooner you begin, the more complete will be your pleasure in this delightful season.