Spring Ephemeral Wildflowers
It‘s the time of year we start yearning for signs of Spring. Any new growth or spring flower is warmly welcomed as a promise that sunshine is on its way and the trees will leaf out bright and green soon.
Even on a snowy February morning in a High Country, the first flower has already bloomed. Behold, the Skunk Cabbage. The Skunk Cabbage amazingly makes its own heat, allowing it to grow and bloom while the ground is still frozen. The name Skunk Cabbage refers to its strong odor, which resembles a skunk.
[Skunk Cabbage photo credit: Rachel Knoepfel]
It blooms before it leafs out, with a purple hood, called a “spathe” covering its spadix, the central flower found inside. Flowers with this deep red-purple generally attract flies and beetles as their pollinators, who are drawn to dying meat, like the Red Trillium and Paw Paw flower.
Not long after the Skunk Cabbage, the rest of the Spring Ephemerals arrive in full bloom. Between March and May, the Spring Ephemerals show out as an inspiring and opportunistic bunch of plants that take advantage of the sunshine that reaches the forest floor before the leaves on the trees grow out and cast shade. The word ‘ephemeral’ means “lasting for a short time”, and they are gone not too long after they arrive. There are dozens of Spring Ephemerals, but we’ll focus on just a few.
Some favorite High Country Spring wildflowers are:
Mayapple photo credit: Becca Nenow
Mayapple plants have a broad, lobed leaf with the stem coming straight up the center, making the leaf resemble an umbrella. Underneath the broad leaf, a white flower with a yellow center can be found blooming in May, hence the name. Mayapples grow in clusters, making them relatively easy to identify. In late Summer, a fruit forms and is edible, but only after it ripens. Find them on trails in town as well as deep in the forest along the Appalachian Trail.
Dwarf-crested Iris photo credit: Becca Nenow
Dwarf-Crested Iris are a High Country native plant staple, and are fun to find for their pop of purple and ornate petals against bright green clusters of leaves. They are found in woodlands and rocky areas, in moist well-draining soil. They can be found along the Mountains-To-Sea Trail on the Blue Ridge Parkway.
Trillium photo credit: Becca Nenow
Trillium is loved by many, and for great reason. These Great White Trillium turn pink after they are pollinated, indicating to pollinators that they should find their nectar elsewhere. Seeds are sometimes spread by ants who come to collect the seed, carry it away, eat the outside, and discard the inner seed a few yards from the plant, allowing a new plant to establish. Find them on the Moses Cone trails.
Each Spring ephemeral is so unique, and their pops of color are even more appreciated after a long winter without much landscape color. To view them in the wild, spend time on the trail with Rachel, our guest guide specializing in native plants and ecology.
To be a good steward of our environment it is important not to pick these flowers. Be careful if stepping off trail not to crush the native plants.
To get out on the trail and find these unique Spring wildflowers, book a hike with Rachel!
Rachel has had a hand in the plant world since 2018, when she began working at New Garden Nursery in Greensboro. She has since worked for two gardening businesses and a forest farm in Western North Carolina, before opening her own ecological landscaping business in 2020, Magna Silva. Her degree in Environmental Science from University of Virginia contributes to her scientific knowledge of plants, while her thousands of miles on trail give her a deep admiration for all the beauty of the forest.
