200 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Apr. 1 



From "The Living Plant. ^ 



THE SKUNK CABBAGE. 

 This plant is valuable in many lo:alities as a source of very early pollen. 



THE SKUNK CABBAGE. 



Its Value as a Source of Early Pollen. 



BY G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



Almost the first if not the very first thing in 

 vegetation to appear above ground in early spring 

 is the skunic cabbage, and I want to tell the read- 

 ers of Gleanings something about this plant 

 which always has been very interesting to me, es- 

 pecially because it is the source of the earliest 

 pollen. If the younger people of the Gleanings 

 family, who live in sections of the country where 

 the skunk cabbage has gained a foothold will take 

 the pains to go out in early spring into any low 

 or marshy lands, which are the places in which 

 the skunk cabbage thrives, they can readily find 

 it, as these "fairy houses" stand about two to 

 three inches high, point up, the same being much 

 variegated in color. The main color of these 

 hoods is a purple ranging from very light to very 

 dark, with stripes of yellowish brown mixed in, 

 these colors being arranged in stripes and 

 "splotches," very much like the skin of the 

 Northern Spy apple. The hood is very 

 hard and tough, as well as unyielding to pres- 

 sure, until enough force is given to break it, 

 and no one, not knowing what it was, would 

 ever mistrust that the thing had life in it, and 

 much less believe it was the" posy-bed " of the 

 skunk cabbage until the house was broken open, 

 when the secret would at once be out, for the 

 perfume of the broken house is three times as 

 strong as that from the bruised leaves which, 

 later on, come up around this house, and so forc- 



ibly remind us of the animal from which it de- 

 rives its name. The opening is a sort of slit in 

 the tough hood covering the flowrets, some of 

 these "doors" being so nearly closed that the 

 bees can not get in. I have seen two and three 

 bees making a desperate struggle to squeeze in 

 through this opening through which they could 

 see and smell the pollen, while the aperture would 

 not admit of their entering. However, the most 

 of these hoods or coverings are fairly well open, 

 so that they admit the bees freely. 



Around nearly all of these plants is generally 

 a mossy substance, although those which grow 

 on higher land do not have it so plentifully. Un- 

 derneath, snuggled down, and mixed with this 

 mossy substance, is often found several somewhat 

 elongated, pea-like-looking things, of a dark- 

 brown color. These are the little bulbs for pro- 

 ducing more skunk-cabbage plants; and in early 

 spring, or during a thaw in winter, after the ac- 

 tion of tlie frost has loosened them from their 

 beds, and the thawing about them made them 

 easily movable, they are carried off and scattered 

 about by any and every freshet, and thus the 

 plants are propagated from these bulbs, very much 

 as are the wild turnips of our woodlands. Each 

 flowret ball which is inside of every hood has 

 from twenty to thirty little knobs on its surface. 

 This ball is about as big as a fair-sized marble, 

 and at each of these little knobs a little spikelet 

 comes out, which is about three-sixteenths of an 

 inch long, on the top or outer extremity of which 

 the pollen-bearing flower grows. These little 

 flowers are not over one-sixteenth of an inch in 

 diameter, and of a lemon color, while the spike- 

 lets which hold them up and out from the little 



