Wildflowers bring joy, feed the spirit
By Jean Caspers-Simmet
simmet@agrinews.com
Date Modified: 04/29/2010 10:43 AM
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It started when my daughter, Willa, wanted to go for a drive to the Minnesota River Valley on Easter Sunday. We were visiting my mother in Bird Island, Minn., about 20 minutes north of the river.
The river flooded pretty bad this year, but I figured we could maneuver around. We drove across the bridge south of Franklin and turned left onto the bottom road on the south side of the river.
It had been nearly 30 years since I'd been on that road in the spring, but I realized we might see trilliums.
During our windshield survey, I saw Pasque flowers blooming on the edge of cattle pastures, a sign that the Snow Trilliums might be there. We continued on to Kettner's Landing and there they were — Snow Trilliums. Three green leaves, three white petals. They covered the north-facing slopes. In places, it was like a carpet hugging the forest floor. I didn't have my camera so I snapped shots with my cell phone.
Snow Trilliums are a sure sign of spring, and this year we needed a sure sign. It was a winter that makes a person weary, and then came floods.
"The snow trilliums are here," I exclaimed to my daughter and mother as I jumped out of the car and headed into the woods.
I'm so excited when I see Snow Trilliums because I just don't see them anywhere else. I know they grow in other places, but the Minnesota River bottom is the only place I've ever seen them.
It grew dark far too soon and we had to travel home the next morning so I couldn't walk through the woods and make an inventory of the other flowers, which is something I liked to do every spring when I lived in the area.
When I dropped Willa off at St. Olaf College the next day on my way back to Iowa, I peeked into the hillside woods just off the parking lot, to see if there were wildflowers. I wasn't disappointed. I took several steps and there was Bloodroot, the green leaves unfolding, revealing white petals. I walked on and I saw Dutchmen's Breeches, which as the name describes, look like little pants hanging on the clothesline. There were elfin leaves and red flowers of Wild Ginger and happy patches of white Anemone.
With three more hours of driving to go, I got back in the car and headed south thinking of wildflowers.
On my way home, my friend Marie called asking if I knew what the white flowers were that were blooming at Ulrich Park, a wild area where she runs her dogs, just west of Cedar Falls. Despite the rain the next day, I headed out to Ulrich Park for a look. The ground was thick with Trout Lilies, Bloodroot, Dutchmen's Breeches, Nodding Trilliums, Toothwart and May Apples.
I'm hoping that I will soon see Jack in the Pulpits in the woods behind my house. A Jack in the Pulpit has three bright green leaves with jack in his purple and green pulpit underneath. I don't think there's a better preacher anywhere.
Wildflowers give me great joy. They appear on their own schedule each year whether we notice or not., bloom, one after another.
Henry David Thoreau said it well in this Sept. 7, 1852 journal entry: "Where the most beautiful wild flowers grow, there one's spirit is fed, and poets grow."
According to "Iowa's Spring Wildflowers," an Iowa Association of Naturalists' publication, these first spring flowers are called ephemerals and are some of the most beautiful woodland flowers. Ephemeral means "short-lived" and refers to the blossoms of spring wildflowers which begin to fall almost as soon as they bloom.
The naturalists offer this advice: "Please look, smell, and enjoy Iowa's (and Minnesota's) wildflowers without picking or digging."
My advice: Take the time to look for spring wildflowers. They touch your heart and the blooms are gone too soon. It costs nothing but the rewards are great.
Now if I could just see a Lady Slipper....