Woodland Wildflowers, The Rush to Bloom Begins

As you read this, there is a life and death race going on in our Wisconsin woodlands for dozens of plant species known as spring ephemerals.

With the lack of leaf cover of early spring, sunshine is able to penetrate to the forest floor beneath the canopy of deciduous trees. Before the trees leaf out, these wildflowers must not only go through a complete life cycle in a matter of weeks, but also must store up enough carbohydrates in their roots through the process of photosynthesis to grow and produce a flower next spring. Once the leaves appear in the canopy, the sunshine and optimum conditions that spring provides is gone until next year.

One of the favorite and most abundant of these ephemerals in our area goes by the name of trout lilly. Some discussion could be had about how this flower acquired such a name, but the one that makes the most sense to me likens the blotches found on the leaf to the appearance of trout swimming just beneath the surface in a spring brook.

Both the yellow and white trout lillies can be found easily in our area. The white one is abundant in my own yard, while the yellow one, which boasts a larger bloom, seems to be the more common in many of our parks.

Being one of the first flowers of spring, the blooms provide both nectar and pollen that are critically important in the rearing of larval bumblebees. In turn, the young bumblebees grow fast enough to be pollinators for early season crops and fruit trees.

As soon as the trout lilly is done blooming it dies back and goes into dormancy for the 10 months or so until the following spring. During the formation of the seed a small addition to the seed coat consists of a collection of proteins that serve as an attractive food to ants and other insects. When the seed is found the insect carries the seed away to feed on this protein. Once eaten, the rest of the seed serves no purpose to the insect and is discarded well away from the parent plant. What a neat way for a plant to form new colonies!

The trout lilly is only one of the many plants that must bloom quickly to take advantage of the conditions that are available for a short time until the larger trees leaf out. Blooming amongst them will be such beautiful flowers as trillium, hepatica, marigolds, may apples and such interestingly named flowers as dutchman’s-breeches.

Going for a walk at any of our woodland green spaces will provide plenty of wildflowers to enjoy. Take along your field guide and see how many you can identify, but I’m warning you, you better get out there soon because they won’t last long!