What's in Bloom
Bloom Highlights
Euphorbia palustris
Marsh Spurge
This plant is native to the marshes, wetlands, and river basins of central and eastern Europe as well as western Asia. The fleshy stems are light green, erect, and branching. They bear soft, green, elliptical, 2- to 3-inch-long leaves oppositely. The sporadic branching and long leaves give each clump an upright mounding habit. The stems and leaves contain a milky white latex that can cause contact dermatitis and is mildly toxic if consumed. In late spring, the terminus of each stem and branch produces many green cyathia inflorescences arranged in a cyme-like cluster. Each “flower” is made of two distinct flowers, one female and one male. The flowers do not have sepals or petals and comprise just the sexual components of the respective flowers. However, each cyathium is subtended by a pair of yellow bracts that last until the plant dies back to the ground. This plant self-seeds and will form large colonies if left untended. The genus name honors an ancient Greek physician, Euphorbos, who served the court of King Juba II and wrote extensively about the medical uses of the sap of this genus as a powerful purgative. The specific epithet means “of the marsh” in Latin.
Fothergilla major
Large Fothergilla
Native to the southern Appalachia and the Piedmont regions of the southeastern United States, this shrub is commonly found in mesic to dry areas of rich woodlands, stream banks, and on rocky slopes and ridges. This slow growing deciduous shrub has an erect, rounded habit with slender twigs. The bark is brownish-grey and smooth. The stems bear leaves alternately. The leaves are dark green and leathery with greyish undersides that are slightly pubescent with dentate margins. In the fall, the leaves have excellent color, turning shades of red, orange, and yellow before falling off their stems. In the spring, the previous year’s growth produces erect spikes of densely clustered, tiny, fragrant flowers that are apetalous but have long, showy stamens. The flowers produce small, two-seeded capsules that are not showy but pop open explosively to disperse their seeds. The genus name honors English physician and botanist Dr. John Fothergill. The specific epithet means “large.”
Paeonia obovata
Japanese Peony
This plant is native to northern China, Siberia, the Korean Peninsula, and Japan where it found in deciduous and mixed conifer forest. This herbaceous perennial has a stout scrubby habit. The stalks produce biternate compound leaves that are glossy and greyish green. The lateral ternate leaflets are elliptic while terminal ternate leaflets are obovate, and all leaflets have smooth margins. By midspring, the stalks produce large, cup-shaped, slightly fragrant flowers with soft, nearly translucent, white petals. At the center of each flower are many stamens with filaments that are purple at their bases that fade to white to support yellow anthers in a ring around two to six pistils. After the flower fades, the ovaries ripen and split open, exposing glossy black seeds on red stalks. The genus name is derived from the name Paeon. According to Greek mythology, Paeon was the student of Asclepius and the physician of the gods. The specific epithet comes from Latin meaning “inverted egg-shaped” from ob- meaning “opposite” and ovatus meaning “egg-shaped,” in reference to the shape of the leaflets.
Primula veris
Cowslip Primrose
This plant is commonly found in open grounds like meadows and coastal dunes, and in the dappled shade of open woodlands of temperate Europe and western Asia. This herbaceous perennial grows in distinct clumps of green, basal rosette foliage. The softly pubescent leaves are ovate to lanceolate with dentate margins and deep veins, causing the leaf blades to be slightly wrinkled. From the basal rosette, pubescent flower stalks grow, producing fragrant, nodding, solitary flowers or a cluster of up to five flowers. Each flower has a narrow, funnel-shaped, tubular calyx that surrounds a trumpet-shaped corolla. The corolla is comprised of five lemon-yellow petals with a notch at each apex and an orange nectar guide in the middle that leads down into the tubular portion of the corolla. The whole plant dies back by the height of summer. The genus name is the female diminutive of the Latin word primus meaning “first,” referring to how many plants in this genus flower early, while the specific epithet is Latin for “flowering in spring.”
Staphylea pinnata
European Bladdernut
This plant is native to Europe from France to the Caucasus, where it is found in temperate woodlands. This plant grows as a multi-stemmed, erect shrub with dense foliage. The young stems are slender, green, and smooth and as they mature produce a thin, greyish-brown bark that is rough with white fissures. The branches bear pinnately compound leaves oppositely. The leaflets are ovate to lanceolate with serrate margins. In late spring and early summer, young shoots produce long, pendulous panicles from leaf axils. The small, white flowers are fragrant and urn- to bell-shaped. Each flower has five white sepals that have a reddish blush at their tips and five white petals that are distinct from each other but still form a tube around the stamens and pistil. The flower ovaries turn coppery brown, inflating to become a papery seed capsule with three lobes. The genus name comes from the Greek word staphyle meaning “cluster,” referring to the flowers, while the specific epithet comes from Latin meaning pinnate or “feather-like,” referring to the arrangement of the leaflets.
Syringa vulgaris ‘Paul Thirion’
Paul Thirion Common Lilac
Common lilac (Syringa vulgaris) is native to the Balkan region of southeastern Europe, where it is found in open woodlands, scrublands, and on the rocky slopes. It grows as a large, multi-stemmed shrub with varying growth habits depending on its surroundings. The stems are stout, smooth, and green and turn grey as they mature before producing light greyish-brown bark that has raised lenticels and leaf scars. The young stems and branches produce leaves oppositely. The cool green leaves are cordate with smooth margins. Fragrant flowers are produced from leaf axils of young shoots on dense conical panicles of cymes, usually in pairs. The flowers have a toothed, tubular calyx around four purple, lavender-blue petals fused together into a tube before spreading apart into a plus-shape. This cultivar is noted for its dark aubergine buds that open to reveal large, semi-double, rosy-pink to soft violet-blue flowers in dense clustered panicles. The genus name comes from the Greek word syrinx meaning “tube” or “pipe,” as the stems are filled with pith that is easily removed. The specific epithet is Latin for the word “common.”