“Vernal pools, also called vernal ponds or ephemeral pools, are seasonal pools of water that provide habitat for distinctive plants and animals.” Wikipedia

Occasionally there is water in a vernal pool next to the yoga studio where I take classes three days a week. It’s a special place. Well, yes indeed, the studio is a special place. That’s why I’m there three days a week, but I’m speaking now of the vernal pool. It has very seldom been there in its wet form for quite some time. I miss it. It presents all sorts of fascinating things to me when it is there providing moisture for plants and animals that need it. 

This is one of those fascinating things. Something I didn’t know anything about until this evening as I sit here thumbing through various articles about it.

Today my dear yoga teacher, Kumud Vanderveer, happened to point out some Cattails growing in a ditch next to the road going past the studio. She asked me a couple things about them and I realized I knew nothing at all about them.

These pictures were taken in the vernal pool back when it was filled with water providing me with all sorts of picture opportunities. These are Broadleaf Cattail (Typha latifolia), a perennial herbaceous wetland plant native in expansive areas of Eurasia and North America, and in more limited areas of Africa and South America. It survives only in shallow water, up to two feet deep, and can tolerate some periods of drying out.

Now I know that the sausage or hotdog looking things on the stems (referred to as pods in one article I just read) are the plants’ flowers. There are two separate sections. The very tiny male flowers are on the upper portion of the stalk, in the photo above looking nearly black and gray. The very tiny female flowers are just below, the rust colored hotdog looking things. Once seeds begin to form the male flowers fade and drop into the water. These pictures are at the point where seeds have already started to form.

As the seeds mature and dry out the seed head bursts, spreading the seeds on the wind.

Tiny seeds. Oodles of seeds. Each seed head can contain 100,000 to 200,000 seeds. Every seed has hairs attached that help it drift with the wind.

And now Cattails are not quite the mystery plant that they were.

________________________________

If you would like to receive my daily blog posts by email, sign up here!