Flowering Season - August-October.
Distribution - Northern United States to Florida, chiefly along Atlantic coast.
Low-lying meadows gay with gerardias were never seen by that quaint old botanist and surgeon, John Gerarde, author of the famous "Herball or General Historie of Plants," a folio of nearly fourteen hundred pages, published in London toward the close of Queen Elizabeth's reign.He died without knowing how much he was to be honored by Linnaeus in giving his name to this charming American genus.
Large patches of the lavender-pink gerardia, peeping above the grass, make the wayfarer pause to feast his eyes, while the practical bee, meanwhile, takes a more substantial meal within the spreading funnels.It is his practice to hang upside down while sucking, using the hairs on the filaments as footholds.
Naturally he receives the pollen on his underside - just where it will be rubbed off against the stigma impeding his entrance to the next funnel visited.Any of the very dry pollen that may have fallen on the hairy filaments drops upon him.
"And 'tis my faith that every flower Enjoys the air it breathes,"chanted Wordsworth.It is a special pity to gather the gerardias, which, as they grow, seem to enjoy life to the full, and when picked, to be so miserable they turn black as they dry.Like their relatives the foxgloves, they are difficult to transplant, because it is said they are more or less parasitic, fastening their roots on those of other plants.When robbery becomes flagrant, Nature brands sinners in the vegetable kingdom by taking away their color, and perhaps their leaves, as in the case of the broom-**** and Indian pipe; but the fair faces of the gerardias and foxgloves give no hint of the petty thefts committed under cover of darkness in the soil below.
The SMALL-FLOWERED GERARDIA (G.Paupercula) so like the preceding species it was once thought to be a mere variety, ranges westward as far as Wisconsin, especially about the Great Lakes.But it is a lower plant, with more erect branches, smaller flowers, quite woolly within, and with a decided preference for bogs as well as low meadows.
In salt marshes along the Atlantic Coast and the Gulf of Mexico, from Maine to Louisiana, the SEA-SIDE GERARDIA (G.maritima)flowers in midsummer, or a few weeks ahead of the autumnal, upland species.The plant, which rarely exceeds a foot in height, is sometimes only four inches above ground; and although at the North the paler magenta blossoms are only about half the length of the purple gerardias, in the South they are sometimes quite as long.
In dry woods and thickets, on banks and hills from Quebec to Georgia, and westward to the Mississippi we find the SLENDERGERARDIA (G.tenuifolia), its pale magenta, spotted, compressed corolla about half an inch long; its very slender, low stem set with exceedingly narrow leaves.
TWIN-FLOWER; GROUND VINE
(Linnaea borealis) Honeysuckle family Flowers - Delicate pink or white tinged with rose, bell-shaped, about 1/2 in.long, fragrant, nodding in pairs on slender, curved pedicels from an erect peduncle, 2-bracted where they join.Calyx 5-toothed, sticky; corolla 5-lobed, bell-shaped, hairy within; 4stamens in pairs inserted near base of tube; 1 pistil.Stem:
Trailing, 6 in.to 2 ft.long; the branches erect.Leaves:
Opposite, rounded, petioled, evergreen.
Preferred Habitat - Deep, cool, mossy woods.
Flowering Season - May-July.
Distribution - Northern parts of America, Europe, and Asia.In the United States southward as far as the mountains of Maryland, and the Sierra Nevadas in California.
With the consent of modest Linnaeus himself, Dr.Gronovius selected this typical woodland blossom to transmit the great master's flame to posterity -"Monument of the man of flowers."
But small and shy as it is, does Nature's garden contain a lovelier sight than scores of these deliciously fragrant pink bells swaying above a carpet of the little evergreen leaves in the dim aisle of some deep, cool, lonely forest? Trailing over prostrate logs and mossy rocks, racing with the partridge vine among the ferns and dwarf cornels, the plant sends up "twin-born heads" that seem more fair and sweet than the most showy pampered darlings of the millionaire's conservatory.Little wonder that Linnaeus loved these little twin sisters, or that Emerson enshrined them in his verse.
Contrary to popular impression, this vine, that suggests the dim old forest and exhales the very breath of the spring woods, will consent to run about our rock gardens, although it seems almost a sacrilege to move it from natural surroundings so impressively beautiful.Unlike the arbutus, which remains ever a wildling, pining slowly to death on close contact with civilization, the twin-flower thrives in light, moist garden soil where the sun peeps for a little while only in the morning.By nodding its head the flower protects its precious contents from rain, the hairs inside exclude small pilferers; but bees, attracted by the fragrance and color, are guided to the nectary by five dark lines and a patch of orange color near it.