The deciduous forests of eastern North America seem very dull as winter becomes spring. The snow vanishes to leave a layer of brown leaves under the leafless trees.
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| central Minnesota forest in April |
Nevertheless, as the temperatures warm, it is irresistable to wander outdoors in the forest.
And, then you spot a spring wildflower!
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Can you see it? A pink flower (pink form of rue anemone,
Thalictrum thalictroides) |
Here is a closer view:
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rue anemone, Thalictrum thalictroides (buttercup family, Ranunculaceae)
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I walked eastern deciduous forest at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum near the end of April. At first my reaction was as stated above; I'm too early for flowers, just a few green shoots are up. But I was wrong, a variety of things were blooming. They were exciting to find.
Sharp-lobed hepatica (Hepatica acutifolia, buttercup family, Ranunculaceae). This is a genus of seven species, found in North America and across Eurasia to Japan. The leaves were thought to resemble the liver, hence the name hepatica, which means "of the liver" in Latin. One of its older common names is liverwort, wort being an old word for "plant." This is confusing because liverwort is the common name of a major group of plants, ones that lack both flowers and a vascular system (xylem and phloem), but that were also thought to resemble the liver link. Hepaticas were used to treat liver ailments in the past, but modern studies do not find them to be effective. Just enjoy discovering their early spring flowers.
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Sharp-lobed hepatica (Hepatica acutifolia)
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Bloodroot Sanguinaria canadensis (poppy family, Papaveraceae). The plants were up but just one of the flowers open when I saw them. "Blood" and "Sanguinaria" (as in sanguine, bloody) in the name make the pure white flowers kind of a surprise. But if you've ever had reason to pull up bloodroot, you know the name is descriptive: the sap in the root is a lurid red-orange. It is a pretty good dye, directly staining hands or face or tools and converting into a cloth dye if mordanted with alum. People living where bloodroots grow--in the forests of the eastern half of North America--have known this and used the dye for millennia. Sanguinaria is a monotypic genus, with only the one species, that is how distinctive it is.
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| Bloodroot Sanguinaria canadensis |
Minneapolis, and Minnesota generally, are at the western edge of a huge expanse of forest that stretched to the Atlantic Coast, south into Georgia, north to where it met the pine forest (boreal forest) of New England and Canada. This forest is called a hardwood forest, because its common trees, like oaks and maples, are hardwoods, in contrast to forests of softwoods like white pines and hemlocks. It is also called a deciduous forest because the common and abundant trees lose their leaves every fall, to grow them back in the spring.
A consequence of the fact that the trees are deciduous is that there is a period in the spring as the temperatures rise, before the trees leaf out, when lots of warm sunlight reaches the forest floor. Many small herbaceous plants take advantage of that, to grow and flower before the trees' leaves shade them. They are often called ephemerals, because very briefly they have lovely flowers and attract pollinators, then develop their seeds, and sit as nondescript leaves through the summer. It is this group that is such a joy to discover in early spring.
A white false rue anemone (
Eremion biternatum, formerly
Isopyrum biternatum, buttercup family, Ranunculaceae). It looks a lot like a rue anemone but the leaves are quite different. The species epithet points to that:
bi-ternatum indicates that the leaflets are paired and then paired again (see leaf photo in Wikipedia
link). It is rare and protected in some parts of its range.
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| false rue anemone (Eremion biternatum) |
I spotted trilliums, also called wake-robins (
Trillium species, bunchflower family, Melanthiaceae) but I did not see open flowers. I thought these would have white flowers, but the beautiful mottled leaves point to prairie trillium,
Trillium recurvatum, which has dark red flowers. Red trilliums are famous for smelling like rotting meat, not the sweet smell you anticipate, because their pollinators are flies, attracted to the smell of carrion. I couldn't smell this one, but I've sniffed red trilliums in the forests of New York. Phew!
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| Trilliums, probably prairie trillium, Trillium recurvatum |
There were also seedlings. I do not know what these new plants will be, but they signal a new growing season.
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| seedlings |
Here are fiddleheads, the new shoots of ferns. They will never show us flowers; ferns reproduce by spores (
link). Medieval people in Europe found flowers or cones on other plants, so, stumped by the not finding fern flowers, they concluded that the flowers of ferns are invisible.
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| fiddleheads, new fern shoots |
I didn't see many animals--too many people walking in the Arb on that April morning--but they are there. Something, likely a deer, severed these leaves. As a rule you do not want to taste the first leaves of spring, because animals are always hungry early in the spring, so many of the plants are very bitter or sour or poisonous as protection from being eaten.
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| half-eaten leaves |
This was one of my favorites, marsh marigold, also called cowslips and a variety of other names,
Caltha palustris (buttercup family, Ranunculaceae). A widely distributed plant across the Northern Hemisphere, marsh marigold has bright yellow flowers in early to middle spring, in marshy areas or, as here, in the stream itself. Conspicuous, they are a symbol of spring across much of the world, gathered and celebrated in May Day and other spring celebrations.
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| marsh marigold, Caltha palustris |
This was the first time ever that I had ever seen merrybells, Uvularia grandiflora (bellwort family, Colchicaceae, closely related to lilies). The location, near a bench, suggested the Arboretum had planted it, but it was growing in the habitat where it is native. Uvularia is an endemic genus of only five species found in eastern deciduous forests in North America. Very striking.
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merrybells, Uvularia grandiflora
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I remind you, the forest around me looked like this, as if nothing were growing.
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| Minnesota forest in late April |
This will all have changed quickly, with new flowers appearing daily and the forest floor becoming greener and greener as new leaves cover the dead ones. Here is the Arboretum's sign showing some of the flowers to expect in early, mid, and late spring.
Remember for next year, when the winter seems endless and the spring very late, to walk into the forest and look carefully.
Comments and corrections welcome.
References
Coffey, T. 1993. The History and Folklore of North American Wildflowers. Houghton Mifflin Company, New York,
Moyle, J. B. and E. W. Moyle. 2001. Northland Wildflowers. revised edition. University of Minnesota Press. Minneapolis, MN.
Sanders, J. 1993. Hedgemaids and Fairy Candles. Ragged Mountain Press, Camden, Maine.
Kathy Keeler
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