This week in the woods, one of our most exquisite spring ephemeral wildflowers is starting to bloom. Bloodroot — a member of the poppy family that gets its name from the red juice in its roots and stem — pushes up from the leaf litter and blooms in just a few days. You may first notice it as a leaf curled around a central stem. The flowers are pure white with pollinator-attracting bright yellow stamens. A fun feature of this plant is that its flowers are nyctinastic, meaning that they close up at night, and may not open at all on overcast days.
One of the joys of spring ephemerals is that you never really know where they’re going to pop up. We were delighted to come home from a trip and discover this red trillium, also known as wake robin, waiting by the house for its photo opp. Chances are, we have an ant to thank for its presence. Blood root and trilliums, as well as a number of other spring ephemerals, produce seeds attached to fatty, sticky structures called elaiosomes, which entice ants to carry the seeds back to their nests. The ants eat the elaiosomes, leave the seeds, and voilà, a wildflower crops up in a new growing space. Here’s a third friend-impressing (or eye roll-inducing) word for the week: myrmecochory, a term for ant-based seed dispersal. You can read about elaiosomes, myrmecochory, and more in this Outside Story article by Meghan McCarthy McPhaul, and this article by Howard Krum, also from the series. Krum casts doubt on the whole plant-as-nature’s-good guys assumption, and points to evidence suggesting that elaiosome producing wildflowers may be getting a free ride from the ants, without really offering much nutritive value – and possibly even suppressing ant reproduction.
Also – when you’re out looking for spring flowers on the forest floor, a reminder to look up into the tree branches, as well. American box elders, for example, are putting out male and female flowers now (the ones in the photo are males, which are less stringy looking than the female flower clusters, and have stamens that are rusty colored in their early stage).
What have you noticed in the woods this week? Submit a recent photo for possible inclusion in our monthly online Reader Photo Gallery.