N 



17 



WOOD ANEMONE; WIND 

 FLOWER. 



This species, shown on the left of 

 the picture, is exceedingly delicate in 

 appearance but appearances are often 

 deceptive for, frail as it seems, it 

 blooms in April and early May. 

 Swayed this way and that, with a 

 violence that threatens to demolish it, 

 it safely weathers the most severe 

 storms and with the appearance of 

 the sun its nodding head beckons a 

 welcome to the early bees. Very ap- 

 propriate indeed is its most common 

 name of Wind Flower. The single 

 flower head rises above a whorl of 

 three five-parted leaves that top a 

 slender stem; the four to seven sepals are pure white within 

 but purplish white on the outside; they would spread about 

 an inch; but are rarely seen fully expanded, usually hang- 

 ing bell-like. The stem grows from a horizontal rootstock. 

 RUE ANEMONE. 



This species is smaller in every respect than the Wind 

 Flower. Both kinds grow in our woods, often side by side. 

 Rue Anemone has a very slender and delicate stem growing 

 from a little cluster of tuberous roots ; the whorl of leaves 

 is more than three in number and each leaf has a heart- 

 shaped base and is three-lobed; instead of a single blossom, 

 several flowers rise on slender stalks above the leaves. 



Tall Meadow Rue is an ambitious, bushy looking plant 

 that rears its filmy flower heads from two to five feet above 

 ground in swamps or along streams. The long-stemmed 

 leaves are many times compounded into small three-lobed 

 leaflets; the flowers are in feathery clusters, each composed 

 of many long stamens and no petals, but having usually 

 four, early-falling sepals. 



