226 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



less wings in widening circles, high above this wintry 

 landscape that stretches far, far below them. 



An you -in|) for a moment, you wonder whether spring 

 is really at hand whether this is spring ; or must an- 

 other freeze and another snow come and be conquered 



WHKRK THE SKUNK CABBAGE FLOURISHES 



The 



Fig. 1 A bog in April, near the Zoological Park, Washington, D. 

 trees are still leafless, while the skunk cabbages are far advanced, as arc 

 also the mandrakes or May apples. Both have made their way up 

 through the heavy layer of oak and poplar leaves. 



by the sun's greater power, before all this is to be treated 

 to the charms of the gentler season. 



Of a sudden you detect an odor that floats up from 

 beneath your feet. It is not necessary to describe it. It 

 is a well-known fact that this odor is by no means un- 

 pleasant to some, while others compare it to a mixture of 

 all the foetid smells they can possibly conjure up in their 

 minds. You have stumbled over and badly crushed two 

 beautiful spathes of the famous skunk cabbage that's 

 all. Even Neltje Blanchan, who, as a rule, loves every 

 odor that nature carries to her, seems to depise this one, 

 as she asks this question : "Why is the entire plant so 

 foetid that one flees the neighborhood, pervaded as it is 

 with an odor that combines a suspicion of skunk, putrid 

 meat, and garlic?" 



Richard Anthony Salisbury gave the plant its present 

 generic name of Symplocarus, it being derived from 

 two Greek words meaning connection and fruit. It is 

 well named, for it invites attention to the fact that the 

 ovaries coalesce or blend, to form a compound fruit. 

 Rafinesque had it Spathyema, while Linnaeus is responsi- 

 ble for its specific name of foetidus, the meaning of which 

 is not far to seek in the lexicon much less in the plant 

 itself. As a species, it is distinctly a floral representative 

 of the region of moist bottoms and bogs, and in such 

 places is very abundant from Nova Scotia to North Caro- 

 lina, westward to Ontario, Minnesota and Iowa. 



That the skunk cabbage belongs in the Arum family 

 (Araceae) almost goes without the saying, for, as Gray 

 points out, they are "Plants with acrid or pungent juice, 

 simple or compound often veiny leaves, and flowers 

 crowded on a spadix, which is usually surrounded by a 

 spathe." All this applies distinctly to the subject of this 

 article, and equally well to its family relatives, the most 

 conspicuous and well-known of which are the two species 

 of Dragon Arum (Arisaema), the Green Dragon being 

 one and our common Jack-in-the-pulpit the other. Then 

 there is the familiar Peltandra or Arrow Arum and the 

 Water Arum (Calla) ; finally, the Golden Club (Oron- 

 tium) and the Sweet Flag or Calamus (Acapus). All of 

 these are common aquatic plants throughout various 

 regions and special localities of the country. It is an in- 

 teresting group, and several of them are favorites with 

 a great many people. 



It is not an unusual thing to have snow on the ground 

 when the skunk cabbages first come up in the early 

 spring; the beautiful, sessile spathe is the part of the 

 plant that first shows itself. This is elegantly colored, 

 while its form is well shown in Figures 2, 4, 5 and 6 of 

 the present article. This spathe, although it possesses 



FIRST APPEARANCE OF THE LEAVES 



Fig. 2 Often the fleshy spadix, over-arched by the magnificently colored 

 spathe of the skunk cabbage, is fully developed ere the brilliant green 

 cone, made up of closely folded leaves, unrolls and expands, to enjoy 

 the warmth of the sun's rays, even before the winter has fairly gone by. 



the same general form in plants as they run, nevertheless 

 varies greatly in contour, size, and coloration. Some are 

 of a purplish black both inside and out, being streaked 

 with dark green and deep buff. Others have a ground 

 color of rich yellowish green, with the streakings of a 

 deep purple, interspersed with some of green. Occasion- 



