ARUM FAMILY. 



ARACEJE. 

 Skunk Cabbage. Symplocarpus fcetidus. 



Found in March or early April, in damp meadows, and moist or 

 swampy woodlands. 



The leaves and hooded flower-clusters rise from the ground. 



The large and conspicuous leaves, which do not unfold until the 

 flowering season is past, vary from 1 to 2 feet in length 7 they are oval 

 in shape with a blunt tip and heart-shaped base, have entire margins, 

 firm texture, and smooth surfaces, and resemble the garden Day-Lily 

 because of their many parallel ribs. In color a light clear green. 



The unnoticeable 4-parted greenish-yellow flowers are gathered 

 closely on a fleshy round club (that is about an inch in diameter) and 

 enveloped by a protecting hood. This hood is large and sharp-pointed, 

 of a very thick and leathery texture, with a smooth and dull glossy 

 surface ; it is a dull brown or mahogany color, mottled or streaked with 

 darker purple or red. From 1 to 3 or 4 of these hood-protected flower- 

 heads are crowded close together, along with the rolled up leaf, in the 

 hold of several dull greenish or slightly purple leaf-like parts which 

 serve as weather blankets wrapped about the whole plant. 



After the flowers mature the hood shrivels and falls away, the 

 blankets disappear, and the pointed leaf-bud then unfolds, the leaves 

 pushing forth with fine springing curves. The strong odor of the 

 plant prevents close observation, and denies to it the praise its growth 

 deserves. In habit it is highly gregarious, and favorable meadows are 

 thickly sprinkled with these rich-hued hoods of our earliest spring 

 flower. 



600 



