Category: Ephemeral

Virginia Bluebells just Beginning

The air was still today. A very welcome respite from the whipping wind of the past few days. The warmish spring weather and bright sunshine called to me. My camera and I roamed looking for ephemerals making their appearance, and I returned with many images to add to my stash.

One discovery, Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica). At this point in their short lives I find they are not showing their exceptional blue, but glorious purple and brilliant pink.

The exceptional blue I mention in the Virginia Bluebell is something special since only 10% of the world’s 280,000 flowering plant species have blooms that are truly blue. For those of us that are lovers of the color blue, that makes this one a special flower.

Cutleaf Toothwort

A spring ephemeral, a perennial native to eastern North America. Cutleaf Toothwort (Cardamine concatenata).

The “toothwort” of its name is thanks to the appearance of its rhizome.

The Cutleaf Toothwort likes woods with mesic soils covered with lots of leaf litter. This certainly must be the description of the woods where I live. Many of these plants greet the spring each year up here, including a few spots where colonies have formed.

Buds protected by four pale green sepals open to reveal four barely pale pink petals. At the center of each flower is a style with a sphere topped stigma which are surrounded by stamens with green filaments of varying lengths topped by yellow anthers.

Many different pollinators visit these blooms. Fruit of the Toothwort is a slender pod about an inch long containing a single row of tiny seeds.

When the invasive, Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata), starts growing in the area of a population of Cutleaf Toothwort its numbers soon decline. A good reason to fight those invasives.

Virginia Bluebells

An ephemeral spring plant native to eastern North America. Virginia Bluebell (Mertensia virginica). I’m watching. I’m waiting.

I just checked. No sign of them yet. BUT very soon. Surely in less than two weeks I’ll be seeing leaves of purply-green emerging from the soil. Reaching for the sun. These plants enjoy being in a shady location. A location that is exposed to the sun during the spring. A location that will see shade as the leaves of the trees emerge.

The buds my favorite to see. Looking so beautiful soft folds with pink, bluish pink, or purple coloring.

Spring sees two or three weeks of Virginia Bluebells that fade leaving fruit which contain four seeds each.

Midsummer sees the fading of the leaves and stems that will turn into the soil. To be seen next spring again.