Skunk Cabbage and Spring - If it smells like skunk cabbage, it means spring is in the air.

If it smells like skunk cabbage, it means spring is in the air
Bay Naturalist / By Kathy Reshetiloff - Bay Journal

As a kid, I loved to romp in the swampy woodlands behind my neighborhood. During the winter, my friends and I would fearlessly traverse over icy leaves and frozen mud, taking shortcuts to favorite destinations like the local reservoir. As the upland woods and meadows continued to lay dormant, these forested wetlands were the earliest places to come back to life.

Before the first robin, another less adored creature heralds the coming of spring. I knew spring was just around the corner by the emergence of an odd plant; the skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus). One of the first plants to surface, skunk cabbage can appear as early as February, often popping up through snow. In fact, respiration from skunk cabbage often creates enough heat to melt any snow surrounding the plant.

Skunk cabbage is a low-growing herbaceous plant found in swamps, wet woods and stream borders. The common name comes from the plant’s large, cabbage-like leaves and the strong, fetid smell emitted when certain parts of the plant are touched or bruised. This smell is often described as similar to the smell of a skunk The species part of its scientific name, foetidus, translates into “to stink.”

Chemicals present in the plant produce the unpleasant odor. Skatole is a crystalline compound that has a feces-like smell and cadaverine is an organic compound produced as a result of decomposing bacteria on flesh. It is believed the plant mimics this putrid smell to attract insects that specialize in scavenging dead and fecal matter. The insects, lured by the odor, help to pollinate the plant.

Skunk cabbage looks as odd as its smells. A purple-streaked hood, known as a spathe, wraps around and over the knob-shaped flower cluster known as a spadix. The spathe pokes through the ground and often through snow in February. By March or April, flesh-colored flowers appear on the spadix. The respiration of the spadix warms the surrounding air and the enveloping spathe helps to insulate the plant, creating a microclimate of constant warmth.

The flowers develop female parts first, beginning at the top of the spadix. By the time female flowers emerge at the bottom of the spadix, males parts have developed at the top. An opening of the spathe allows for the entry and pollination by some of the earliest flying insects. A variety of insects, including flies and beetles, pollinate skunk cabbage. Because it is such as an early flowering plant, skunk cabbage may be one of the first pollen sources for honey bees.

After pollination, the spadix bends toward the ground and the spathe disintegrates. Large green leaves, rolled up, emerge on thick stalks. After unrolling, the leaves continue to grow, often becoming 2 feet long by summer. The spadix turns black and becomes a compound fruit. The large seeds are eaten by wood ducks and game birds such as pheasant, grouse and bobwhite quail.

Another, more familiar plant is also found in damp woods and swamps. Jack-in-the-pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum) appears as early as March. It, too, sports a purple and green mottled spathe (the pulpit) enveloping a club-shaped spadix (the Jack) of male and female flowers. The spathe on this plant is more elegant; vase-shaped and tapering to a delicate point.

Flowering occurs later than skunk cabbage, usually March through June. The fruit, a cluster of red berries on the spadix, appears late in the summer through fall and is relished by pheasant, turkey and wood thrush.

Jack-in-the-pulpit ranges from Nova Scotia and New Brunswick to Minnesota and south to Florida and eastern Texas.

Both plants, members of the arum family of plants, contain needle-like crystals of calcium oxalate that produce a burning sensation if the plant parts are eaten raw. Drying eliminates this unpleasant characteristic. Dried skunk cabbage leaves can be added to soups and stews and the roots can be ground for flour. Native Americans gathered the fleshy taproots of Jack-in-the-pulpit as a vegetable.

As a child, whenever I spied these odd-shaped plants peaking out of the ground, I knew that spring was not far behind. The frozen shortcuts that I had become accustomed to throughout the winter would soon be gone. Temperatures would steadily climb, causing a gradual thaw. The ground would turn even soggier with April rains. I would no longer be able to traverse these wetlands, as the weight of my 12 years would surely cause me to sink at least ankle-deep in muck.

Soon, I would have to hike the longer trails, bypassing the swamps. Soon, I would be confined to the higher grounds of spring.


Kathryn Reshetiloff is with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Chesapeake Bay Field Office in Annapolis.



If it smells like skunk cabbage, it means spring is in the air

Article from Bay Journal - Feb 2006