PONTEDERIACEiE-PICKEREL-WEED 

 FAMILY 



A family of perennial bog plants having usually large thick 

 leaves standing up well above the mud and water on long petioles. 

 The flowers are perfect, more or less irregular, and borne upon a 

 spadix that issues from a spathe which is soon outgrown. The 

 familiar Pickerel-weed of shallow, clear-flowing, northern streams 

 is the one species transferred from its wild home to the garden. 



PICKEREL-WEED 



Pontedhia cordata. 



Named in honor of Giulio Pontedera, professor of botany in Padua; 

 1688-1757. 



Stem. — Rather stout, two to three feet high, one-leaved, with several 

 sheathing bract -like leaves at the base. 



Leaves. — With many parallel veins, ovate, cordate-sagittate, the 

 apex and the basal lobes obtuse; basal lobes often with long narrow 

 appendages; radical leaves long-petioled. 



Spaddx and Inflorescence. — Glandular-pubescent. 



Flowers. — Terminal, ephemeral, numerous, borne on a spadaceous 

 spike; blue; trimorphous. 



Perianth. — Funnel-shaped, two-lipped, tube slightly curved; upper 

 lip of three ovate lobes, the middle lobe longest; the lower lip of three 

 linear spreading lobes. 



Stamens.— Six, borne at unequal distances upon the perianth tube, 

 three of them opposite the lower lip; the others opposite the upper lip. 

 , Owry.— Three-celled, two cells abortive and empty, oblong, tapering 

 into the style; stigma minutely toothed. 



Fridt. — Enclosed in the thickened base of the perianth. 



To one who, as a child, played and fished in northern streams 

 the Pickerel-weed suggests long summer days, clear slow-flowing 

 water, trout and pickerel hidden among the weeds of the brook- 



