For our Fun Monday assignment, Janis of Life According to Jan and Jer is asking us to relate what represents spring to us. First, I must confess that I misinterpreted the assignment. I thought that the assignment was to show pictures of spring flowers. Blossoming flowers do represent spring, but the arrival of the first robin, the melting of snow, fluffy white lambs also proclaim the new season.I enjoy lovely cultivated flowers, but unusual wildflowers tend to be my favorites. Here are two that blossom early here in northwest Indiana. Below nestled in the moss between the bricks is the tiny Whitlow-Grass, Draba verna. You might miss this floral treasure if you are not especially observant.
Another early spring wildflower although not a blossom of beauty is Skunk Cabbage, Symplocarpus foetidus. Both the common name and the species name refer to the fetid odor produced by the purplish-brown flower. I like looking for these odd flowers in late winter. To me the this strange smelly flower foretells the coming season.
14 comments:
I saw my first swallows last week and I did a happy dance around my husband. He always just shakes his head. ha ha.
We have yellow skunk cabbage flowers in our neck of the swamp!
I love those unexpected flowers in cracks! I haven't ever seen a skunk cabbage in person but I think your picture will do me just fine!
I'm hearing lots of birds in the morning and too many frogs at night. Everything is growing, including the lawn and weeds. Spring has sprung! I always wondered where the smell came from; now I know!!
I love the picture of skunk cabbage. Just seems right somehow...thanks.
Its amazing where you might find a wild flower growing...we tend to view a flower that is growing in between cracks as weeds..but that is not always the case. I am not real familiar with skunk cabbage though! Thanks for playing Molly and Happy FM
AACCHHKK ! Skunk Cabbage...I've never see or smelled it, but have to wonder does it smell like it sounds.
Early one morning last spring I dreamed someone was cooking skunk cabbage...then I woke up to the horrible realization that my dogs had tangled with the real live critter...so, whenever someone mentions, "skunk cabbage," that what I think of...like I said earlier:
AACCHHKK!
Love that you notice what goes between the cracks. I tend to take care of those plants (regardless of what they are) as much as the ones that grow where planted just because they are special !
I love everything in spring, the new flowers the growing leaves on the trees and the special smell in the air !
Spring is all of those things. Its also, the NCAA basketball contest. Along it goes the bracket picks. Good Luck with that. However, now the picks are very easy. Most of them have happen already.
Spring is all of those things AND the basketball bracket picks.
Hmmm, not too sure about Skunk Cabbage Molly, but the rest of what you say is very good.
Somehow, skunk cabbage does not remind me of "spring". But, I guess it has to sprout up sometime. I'm not sure if we have any around here. I love your "crack" flowers!
Very interesting choices for Spring!
Wild flowers are just as much part of Spring as their brash garden cousins.
Thanks for sharing.
flowers seem to be popular posts! Sorry it took so long to get around to visit!
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