Know Your Neighbours: Have Some Flowers, Darling

April-May 2003

This is an article from WaveLength Magazine, available in print in North America and globally on the web.
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by Bryan Nichols

Why do we love flowers? Let me count the ways. Romance, colour, form, scent, spring and, let us not forget, subtle sexual signals. Flowers are nature's way of celebrating reproduction; they evolved to attract all sorts of animals, to lure the birds and bees into their sultry, pollinated depths.

So why do humans like them so much? If my opening paragraph didn't work for you, then let's consider our love of colour. Unlike many mammals, our eyes are very good at seeing colour. Most of us appreciate the depth and range of colours our brains translate, and certain women and most interior decorators have even developed extensive vocabularies to accommodate them. What Dave, Bubba and I would call purple they might call lavender, violet or periwinkle. But whether we talk the talk or not, we all love flowers because they indulge our brains in colour.

Of course, it's not all about colour. Georgia'Keefe understood the sensual form of many flowers. They are, after all, reproductive organs meant to entice, even if they did evolve to entice things like bats, bugs and birds. While we won't get into the titillating anatomical details of pistils and stamens, there is something to be said about the elaborate aesthetics of flowery form. And if Ms.'Keefe was a bit too subtle for you, think back to the animated passion of the flowers in the movie "Pink Floyd - The Wall". Nothing subtle about the shapes of those blossoms.

Of course, it's not all about form. Who hasn't been told to stop and smell the roses? Far better sniffers than ours can locate an individual flower in a huge field, or home in on a pale night bloom in a dark forest. I'm not a fan of flowery smells, but who am I to argue with billions of bugs, birds and bats, not to mention the multi-billion dollar perfume and bouquet industries?

BIG NAMES IN FLOWER FAMILIES

Being a biologist, some taxonomy is in order. You'll have heard of these families, and it's worth a few words about them.

Roses (Rosaceae) By any other name, this is a huge family that includes many temperate fruits like apples, cherries, peaches and pears. Our native roses ( Rosa sp) are bushes, rather large bushes at that, and were covered in the Feb/Mar 2001 issue (checklist 17).

Lilies (Liliaceae) Well known for rare and beautiful flowers, lilies were particularly important to Northwest First Nations. The bulbs of many species are edible and were harvested regularly—Europeans added onions and garlic, among other lilies. Several lilies are poisonous, including the drab flowered Indian hellebore ( Veratrum viride) which can be fatal in even small doses but was used extensively (and very carefully) for its medicinal properties. Though it's also somewhat drab, the chocolate lily wins as the tastiest sounding plant of the Northwest.

Orchids (Orchidaceae) Most of ours are small (I've included our prettiest), though this family is huge and diverse in the tropics. If (like me) you prefer tasty desserts to ornamental flowers, vanilla is the most notable orchid.

Violets (Violaceae) Though roses are red, we've got some modest yellow, white and purple violets. This family is notable mainly for its pretty flowers. Irises (Iridaceae) This is another family notable for beauty (including gladioli & crocuses), not food. We have a few with scattered distributions.

Buttercups (Ranunculaceae) The Northwest has plenty of buttercups, including the anemones, larkspurs and monkshoods. I've included the lovely columbine on the checklist.

Sunflowers (Asteraceae) This family competes with the orchids to be the world's most diverse we know it best by the yellowish flowers of dandelions and daisies (weeds from Europe).

Peas (Fabaceae) Though we don't normally think of flowers when we think of peas, this huge family does have some nice ones including those purple blue lupines that can be abundant in ditches. For the gastronomically inclined, the pea family also gives us lentils, beans, peanuts and soy.

Other families with representatives on our list include stonecrop, figwort, morning glory and poppy.

FLOWERS AS FOOD

Many flowers lead to tasty berries and were already covered in the Bushes checklist. Dig a bit under flowers and the most notable in the Northwest are the lilies, especially common camas, described on the checklist. Of course I shouldn't mention camas without noting meadow death camas (Zygadenus venenosus).

What a great name! The flower is unremarkable: smallish, bland white and unpleasant smelling. Unfortunately for hungry humans, this lily grows in the same spots as common camas and the leaves and bulbs look remarkably similar around harvest time, long after the flowers are gone. If "death" and "venenosus" aren't sufficient clues to its notoriety, I'll add a few more word pairs: powerful alkaloids, violent emetic, respiratory difficulties, coma, death.

Besides food and flavouring, many flowering plants were used medicinally by First Nations, even the "poisonous" ones. Imagine learning which plants did what in what amounts and combinations, and then passing that information along without any writing system. This formidable task is something that ethnobotanists study, and Plants of Coastal BC by Pojar & MacKinnon contains oodles of such tidbits.

A WORD ABOUT WEEDS

What is a weed? There are those that believe a weed is any plant you don't buy from a snooty store and painstakingly plant in your yard, feed constantly with an assortment of expensive fertilizers, and pour endless liters of water on. Fortunately this sort of ecological boneheadedness, usually accompanied by sterile, golf course-like lawns, is waning, though not fast enough.

A more intelligent definition of a weed is an invasive exotic species, one that does well in an area in which it is not native.There are often no natural checks and balances on such plants, and they can spread swiftly, crowding out native species that are not used to competing with the newcomers.

On Vancouver Island, European dandelions, Himalayan blackberries and Scotch broom are good examples of weeds. Most weeds were deliberately introduced by Homo sapiens, occasionally to disastrous results. Islands are particularly vulnerable.

TO PLUCK, OR NOT TO PLUCK

Humanity seems to have a yen for bouquets of flowers. If you're the romantic sort, you'll say we love flowers because of their beauty and scent. If you've got a more scientific nature, you might add that our love of flowers is a powerful urge intimately tied to our reproductive success. This is hard to deny - flowers have won many favours over the millennia, and many of us are at least an indirect result of a bouquet daddy gave mommy.

Stopping to smell the flowers and stopping to pick the flowers have different consequences, however, so I'll include a few tips to help minimize any potential harm you might be doing (we always hurt the ones we love).

1. Never EVER pick a rare flower. If you're not sure, never pick any flower that isn't surrounded by dozens, if not hundreds of others just like it.

2. Be gentle with your feet. Crushing ten plants to pick/view/smell one flowering one is bad whether you know you're doing it or not. Be especially careful in fragile (wet, thin or steep) soils.

3. Be aware that picking the flower of many species (such as trillium) is usually fatal to the entire plant, thanks to delicate anatomical issues.

4. Try to pick invasive species which (fortunately) tend to prefer disturbed areas like camps and roadsides.

5. Plant instead of picking - get native wildflower seeds from a knowledgeable nursery and introduce them to your yard. It's easy and can be very beautiful.

6. Instead of taking the flowers to her, take her to the flowers - get outdoors more often, all of you, especially during the spring blooming seasons, when small islands can be covered in flowers.

There are hundreds of flowers a paddler might see along the Northwest Coast, and who am I to choose twelve of them for this issue's Checkllst? Your favorite dozen might be remarkably different, but that's ok. All of these are notable or reasonably common near the ocean, and usually both. If you're appalled that something is missing,keep in mind there are many beautiful flowers that prefer higher elevations. Hikers could wax poetic about the figwort family in subalpine meadows and I've barely mentioned them.

Having said that, I'm going to have to admit to a preference, a weakness if you will, for purple flowers. There's something decadent about lush, vibrant purples, colours that seem to run contrary to the usual browns, greens and yellows of botanical nature. Of course you'll find red, yellow, and even white flowers on this list as well.

BOTANY BY BOAT

Sea kayaks are a surprisingly good way to see flowers, for a couple of reasons related to munching and stomping. A problem for many wildflowers is that the plants they spring from are tasty to sheep and sensitive to shoes (and bulldozers). So many of the meadows that would have been glorious with flowers now have houses, or lawns, or SUV filled parking lots. Even the more remote habitats are overgrazed, driving the little flowers closer and closer to the sea.

Where do even sheep fear to tread? Coastal cliffs. Kayakers working a high tide can check out the nooks, crannies and ledges that are the last refuges for many land plants, areas that might be perfect for a beautiful flower to bloom without fear of molars or boots. Paddling near shore you'll see flowers blooming in cliff potholes, on top of boulders, even on overhanging trees. And of course your kayak can take you past those islands that remain unpaved and unchewed, which can often produce glorious spring and early summer displays. These then, are my flowers to you. Enjoy!

© Biologist Bryan Nichols points out you don't need to know your pistil from your stamen to appreciate the beauty of wildflowers.

FURTHER READING BOOK REVIEW Coastal Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest Elizabeth L. Horn, Mountain Press, 1993 179 pp, US$14 0-87842-291-9 www.mountain-press.com Northwest coast scenery is spectacular but can be rather drab, colour-wise. Coastal wildflowers often make up for this with spectacular blooms, and this book covers the species paddlers are most likely to see. Author Elizabeth Horn worked in the US Forest Service and taught botany in Oregon. In 1994, Mountain Press updated and expanded her original (1980) little wildflower book. The new version has gone through at least four printings since. The photographs are large and colourful - there are full page scenics and large ID photos. The generous sizes make this a beautiful book for foul weather browsing as well as a working field guide. At 21 x 14 cm (colour throughout), it's easy to pack whether hiking or paddling. The book is divided by habitats: beaches & dunes, wetlands, cliffs & grasslands, brushfields, coastal forests. There are brief notes on the exposed coast (from Northern California to the north end of Vancouver Island), coastal vegetation and wildflower photography. Included are helpful diagrams, a glossary and an index of species. I would expand the book to include more coastal species, as it wouldn't lose much packability in doing so. I would also include some sort of a quick direction page that helps you find what you're looking for - a list of flowers by colour perhaps, or simple diagrams to help you guess which family a flower is in. Paddlers who want more colour in their lives would do well to bring along this book, as it covers most of the species we see along Northwest coasts from our boats or while wandering around on shore. Instead of a fleeting bouquet from the florist, pick up a whole book full of wildflowers.

 

Checklist 31 - WILDFLOWERS