Life Sciences Commons^™

2009 Wildflower Of The Year: Skunk Cabbage, Symplocarpus Foetidus, W. John Hayden

Biology Faculty Publications

Skunk cabbage is a coarse herbaceous plant. The stem consists of a stout rhizome oriented vertically in the soil. Leaves and flowers arise from the tip of the rhizome which is often not visible, resulting in the appearance of leaves and flowers arising directly from the swampy mires where these plants grow. Flowers appear during the winter, long before the leaves. The flowers are minute, clustered into a ball-like group (spadix) almost entirely enclosed by a fleshy, hood-like, spathe. The spathe ranges from 8 to 15 cm in height, is more or less pear-shaped, widest near the bottom, and tapers …