First flower of a Bloodroot , Sanguinaria canadensis
It never ceases to amaze me what joy a tiny flower can evoke. Each plant (or more correctly each stem arising from the rhizome) produce only a single flower wrapped by a single furled leaf making each more precious.
From Wikipedia: "Bloodroot is also known as bloodwort, red puccoon root, and sometimes pauson. Bloodroot has also been known as tetterwort in America, although that name is used in Britain to refer to Greater Celandine."
And: "Bloodroot is one of many plants whose seeds are spread by ants, a process called myrmecochory. The seeds have a fleshy organ called an elaiosome that attracts ants. The ants take the seeds to their nest, where they eat the elaiosomes, and put the seeds in their nest debris, where they are protected until they germinate. They also get the added bonus of growing in a medium made richer by the ant nest debris."
posted by Ki at
6:35 PM
7 Comments:
A sure sign of spring, Ki, and one of my most beloved flowers ... captured beautifully. I understand your thrill!
I love this flower - it is a joy seeing them. Their foliage is pretty too. It's great reading about how plants get their names.
Hi Joey,
Thanks Joey. The flower was in full sunlight but I managed to block the light with my body otherwise the white would have been blown out. I do like the photo but I should have brushed off the speck of black dust or is it an insect?
It is surprising how this flower sneaks up on you. You can barely see the gray furled leaves from which the flower pops out. The flower also will close when it's cold and gloomy like today so it's difficult to find even if you know where it is. I just wished they lasted a bit longer than they do. I sure like these spring ephemerals. Thanks for your comment.
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Thanks Kate. And it is a Canadian flower...at least the name indicates so. ;) Like you, I love the deeply cut attractive gray green leaves which is wrapped tightly around the flower stalk and slowly unfurls. Thank you for your comment.
That's a beautiful photo of a beautiful flower. Our woods in central Virginia seem devoid of most of the woodland spring flowers I expected to see, but at least I can admire them through the internet.
I love this flower too. When I first planted mine, I thought I had lost it, or that the place I picked for it wasn't right. But about 4 years later, it made a tiny appearance and since has colonized a nice sized area.
I keep it in a moist cool, shady area and it has proven to be a wonderful wildflower. It comes up with the Virginia Bluebells that are in the same bed but in a different spot. Bloodroot appears to enjoy the richer more deeper shade while the Virginia Bluebells want just as rich a soil but a more difused light.
Quite a cute flower. Sometimes the smallest flowers are the best!
I was catching up with a few of your posts and I can see you are way ahead of us here CT. The Spring post was a wonderful series of photos. I don't know if it will work as I use Firefox on a Mac but when I upload the photos in the wrong order I select the photo that needs to move and use cut and paste to move it to the correct location.
I nominated you for a Mouse and Trowel Award.
Hi Entangled,
Thanks. I planted a couple of bloodroot plants in my small woodland garden so these are not wild. I liked them so much I bought several more and these are the first flowers from those rhizomes. I don't like to go wandering through the woods here because of deer ticks. I don't know if they're active yet but I picked up 5 dog ticks on a mycological outing. Almost had more ticks on me than I found mushrooms. ;) I've even had a couple of deer ticks when mowing next to the wild area adjacent to our property. Luckily I found them before they were firmly attached.
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Hi Julie,
I too have found wild flowers can remain dormant for a couple of year after planting before they appear. I thought I lost several plants and was pleasantly surprised when they flowered. We also have Virginia bluebells that are growing rampantly. Our small patch of a few plants under some rhododendrons have become a mass and we must have inadvertently dug some up because we now have several patches all around the yard! The bluebells do seem to like a good bit of light. Thanks for your comment.
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Hi Chris,
I should be nominating you for the Mouse and Trowel instead. Your photos are vastly superior and of so many different kinds of plants. The consistently good quality of your photos is a good measure of how I'm doing. Thank you for your nomination.
I usually cut and paste too but I find it cumbersome to have to go to the review page and count down the number of photos to where I want to paste. I've got to try the drag and drop or just post one photo at a time ;)
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