WILD FLOWERS [230]
of self-fertilization, the pollen hidden under their lobes ripens and dusts afresh the little flies so impatiently awaiting the feast. Now, and not till now, it is to the advantage of the species that the prisoners be released, that they may carry the vitalizing dust to stigmas waiting for it in younger flowers. Accordingly, the slippery pipe begins to shrivel, thus offering a foothold; the once stiff hairs that guarded its exit grow limp, and the happy gnats, after a generous entertainment and snug protection, escape uninjured, and by no means unwilling to repeat the experience. Evidently the wild ginger, belonging to a genus next of kin, is striving to perfect a similar prison. In the language of the street, the ginger flower does not yet "work" its.visitors "for all they are worth."
Later, when we see the exquisite dark, velvety, blue-green, pipe-vine, swallow-tail butterfly (Papilio philenor) hovering about verandas or woodland bowers that are shaded with the pipe-vine's large leaves, we may know she is there only to lay eggs that her caterpillar descendants may find themselves on their favorite food store.
The VIRGINIA SNAKEROOT or SERPENTARY (A. serpentaria), found in dry woods, chiefly in the Middle States and South, although its range extends northward to Connecticut, New York, and Michigan, is the species whose aromatic root is used in medicine. It is a low-growing herb, not a vine; its heart-shaped leaves, which are narrow and tapering to a point, are green on both sides, and the curious, greenish, S-shaped flower, which grows alone at the tip of a scaly footstalk from the root, appears in June or July. Sometimes the flowers are cleistogamous (see violet wood-sorrel).
FIRE PINK; VIRGINIA CATCHFLY (Silene Virginica) Pink family
Flowers - Scarlet or crimson, 1 1/2 in. broad or less, a few on slender pedicels from the upper leaf-axils. Calyx sticky, tubular, bell-shaped, 5-cleft, enlarged in fruit; corolla of 5 wide-spread, narrow, notched petals, sometimes deeply 2-cleft; 10 stamens; 3 styles. Stem: 1 to 2 ft. high; erect, slender, sticky. Leaves: Thin, spatulate, 3 to 5 in. long; or upper ones oblong to lance-shaped. Preferred Habitat - Dry, open woodland. Flowering Season - May-September. Distribution - Southern New Jersey to Minnesota, south to Georgia and Missouri.
The rich, glowing scarlet of these pinks that fleck the Southern woodland as with fire, will light up our Northern rock gardens too, if we but sow the seed under glass in earliest spring, and set out the young plants in well-drained, open ground in May. Division of old perennial roots causes the plants to sulk; dampness destroys them.
To the brilliant blossoms butterflies chiefly come to sip (see wild pink), and an occasional hummingbird, fascinated by the color that seems ever irresistible to him, hovers above them on whirring wings. Hapless ants, starting to crawl up the stem, become more and more discouraged by its stickiness, and if they persevere in their attempts to steal from the butterfly's legitimate preserves, death overtakes their erring feet as speedily as if they ventured on sticky fly paper. How humane is the way to protect flowers from crawling thieves that has been adopted by the high-bush cranberry and the partridge pea (q.v.), among other plants! These provide a free lunch of sweets in the glands of their leaves to satisfy pilferers, which then seek no farther, leaving the flowers to winged insects that are at once despoilers and benefactors.
WILD COLUMBINE (Aquilegia Canadensis) Crowfoot family
Flower - Red outside, yellow within, irregular, 1 to 2 in. long, solitary, nodding from a curved footstalk from the upper leaf-axils. Petals 5, funnel-shaped, but quickly narrowing into long, erect, very slender hollow spurs, rounded at the tip and united below by the 5 spreading red sepals, between which the straight spurs ascend; numerous stamens and 5 pistils projecting. Stem: 1 to 2 ft. high; branching, soft-hairy or smooth. Leaves: More or less divided, the lobes with rounded teeth; large lower compound
Later, when we see the exquisite dark, velvety, blue-green, pipe-vine, swallow-tail butterfly (Papilio philenor) hovering about verandas or woodland bowers that are shaded with the pipe-vine's large leaves, we may know she is there only to lay eggs that her caterpillar descendants may find themselves on their favorite food store.
The VIRGINIA SNAKEROOT or SERPENTARY (A. serpentaria), found in dry woods, chiefly in the Middle States and South, although its range extends northward to Connecticut, New York, and Michigan, is the species whose aromatic root is used in medicine. It is a low-growing herb, not a vine; its heart-shaped leaves, which are narrow and tapering to a point, are green on both sides, and the curious, greenish, S-shaped flower, which grows alone at the tip of a scaly footstalk from the root, appears in June or July. Sometimes the flowers are cleistogamous (see violet wood-sorrel).
FIRE PINK; VIRGINIA CATCHFLY (Silene Virginica) Pink family
Flowers - Scarlet or crimson, 1 1/2 in. broad or less, a few on slender pedicels from the upper leaf-axils. Calyx sticky, tubular, bell-shaped, 5-cleft, enlarged in fruit; corolla of 5 wide-spread, narrow, notched petals, sometimes deeply 2-cleft; 10 stamens; 3 styles. Stem: 1 to 2 ft. high; erect, slender, sticky. Leaves: Thin, spatulate, 3 to 5 in. long; or upper ones oblong to lance-shaped. Preferred Habitat - Dry, open woodland. Flowering Season - May-September. Distribution - Southern New Jersey to Minnesota, south to Georgia and Missouri.
The rich, glowing scarlet of these pinks that fleck the Southern woodland as with fire, will light up our Northern rock gardens too, if we but sow the seed under glass in earliest spring, and set out the young plants in well-drained, open ground in May. Division of old perennial roots causes the plants to sulk; dampness destroys them.
To the brilliant blossoms butterflies chiefly come to sip (see wild pink), and an occasional hummingbird, fascinated by the color that seems ever irresistible to him, hovers above them on whirring wings. Hapless ants, starting to crawl up the stem, become more and more discouraged by its stickiness, and if they persevere in their attempts to steal from the butterfly's legitimate preserves, death overtakes their erring feet as speedily as if they ventured on sticky fly paper. How humane is the way to protect flowers from crawling thieves that has been adopted by the high-bush cranberry and the partridge pea (q.v.), among other plants! These provide a free lunch of sweets in the glands of their leaves to satisfy pilferers, which then seek no farther, leaving the flowers to winged insects that are at once despoilers and benefactors.
WILD COLUMBINE (Aquilegia Canadensis) Crowfoot family
Flower - Red outside, yellow within, irregular, 1 to 2 in. long, solitary, nodding from a curved footstalk from the upper leaf-axils. Petals 5, funnel-shaped, but quickly narrowing into long, erect, very slender hollow spurs, rounded at the tip and united below by the 5 spreading red sepals, between which the straight spurs ascend; numerous stamens and 5 pistils projecting. Stem: 1 to 2 ft. high; branching, soft-hairy or smooth. Leaves: More or less divided, the lobes with rounded teeth; large lower compound