Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Get to know early blooming wildflowers
GET TO KNOW EARLY BLOOMING WILDFLOWERS IN SOUTHEASTERN PENNSYLVANIA
Today marks the first full week of spring, and the local trails and paths beckon.
There may be some pops of color to be encountered along the way with beautiful early blooming wildflowers, but what are they?
Rebecca Bowen, a botanist who is chief of Conservation Science and Ecological Resources at the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources’ Bureau of Forestry, and Dr. Susan Munch, a botanist and retired Albright College biology professor, offered their expertise on the early blooms.
“People don’t immediately think of shrubs and trees as early spring bloomers,” Bowen said in an email. “But these are actually very important to pollinating insects because many other wildflowers aren’t in bloom yet. Tree and shrub pollen and nectar are really important food sources for insects early in the season.”
She provided the lists of early bloomers:
•American hazelnut (Corylus americana) •Red maple (Acer rubrum) •Slippery elm (Ulmus rubra) •Smooth alder (Alnus serrulata) •Spicebush (Lindera benzoin) •Serviceberries (Amelanchier arborea, A. canadensis and others)
•Round-leaved hepatica (Anemone americana)
•Skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus)
•Trillium species: Snow trillium (Trillium nivale), toadshade (T. sessile), large-flowered trillium (T. grandiflorum), red trillium (T. erectum)
•Spring beauty (Claytonia virginica)
•Wood anemone (Anemone quinquefolia)
•Bloodroot (Sanguinea canadensis)
•Cut-leaved toothwort (Cardamine diphylla), also called cutleaf toothwort
•Columbine (Aquilegia canadensis)
•da mayflower (Maianthemum canadense)
•Yellow trout-lily (Erythronium americanum)
•Dutchman’s breeches (Dicentra cucullaria)
In addition to those provided by Bowen, Munch also included Dutchman’s breeches as one to be on the lookout for this spring.
Munch said her favorite early blooming wildflower is hepatica.
“Partly because it comes in so many early colors that can vary from white to pink to pale purple to blue,” she explained.
Bowen’s pick has a unique odoriferous quality.
“My favorite is actually skunk cabbage,” Bowen said. “It makes me happy to know spring is just around the corner when I see the spathes — flowering part — poking through the ice and snow.
“Skunk cabbage plants generate their own heat through a special type of cellular respiration and thaw the ground around it. It can push up through frozen ground by warming it 27 to 63 degrees above the air temperature. This heat also helps the blooms get pollinated, by carrying the scent — described as rotting flesh or carrion — to carrion-feeding insects.”
Let them be
While skunk cabbage may not be something many people would want to bring home, the beauty of other early wildflowers may be irresistible, but please don’t bring them home,
“Don’t pick any of them!” Munch said emphatically. “Take only pictures.”
“First, it is unlawful to remove plants or plant parts from state forest, state parks or state game lands,” Bowen said.
“You are allowed to remove plant material for your own family’s consumption from state forest land — for example, berry-picking — but not for commercial use.
“Also, by enjoying wildflowers where they are, and leaving them intact, taking only pictures, you will be acting as a good steward and allowing the plant to flower, set seed and reproduce.
“By picking flowers, you remove their reproductive effort, so they do not get pollinated and no seed gets produced, thereby reducing the population.
“Over time, this can cause a species to become endangered — many orchid species are vulnerable to over-harvesting because of their beauty, for example.”
Munch said the pink lady-slipper orchid is a Pennsylvania native plant that has suffered this fate.
“You can’t move them,” Munch said.
She said they have very specific soil conditions needed for survival that rarely can be replicated.
The Showy pink lady-slipper currently is listed as threatened in Pennsylvania.
The Pennsylvania Natural Heritage Program has a list of all at-risk species on its website, www.naturalheritage.state.pa.us/Species.aspx. The results can be broken down by county.