The Original Mystery Plant
Dr. John Nelson

Photo by John Nelson

The young, tender leaves, boiled, have been used for a long time as a pot-herb which means that cooking is involved - in this case, a lot of cooking, as they must never be eaten raw.

The plant's parts tend to be poisonous, especially late in the growing season. The proper recipes for producing a mess of greens from this plant involve boiling the young leaves two or three times, changing the water on each occasion. You can actually purchase this delicacy canned or find various recipes for its preparation, picked yourself. Most of these recipes involve a considerable amount of fatback, salt, and/or hot-sauce. Nearly all of its relatives are tropical, in both South America and in Africa. Some even attain "big tree" size.

Our plant is definitely an herb, a perennial, coming back year after year from massive root crowns. It grows up quickly, making smooth stems and leaves. The stems are rather fragile, hollow and pithy, and easily broken or knocked down.

In the summer, flowers are produced on racemes, which appear one at a time opposite a stem leaf. Twenty or 30 flowers will be produced on the raceme. This is one of those plants whose flowers have no petals. There are instead, five sepals, white or pink, which appear to be petals, and thus are said to be petaloid. Many stamens are included within each flower, as are a number of pistils, all arranged in a ring. These beautiful plants get to be five or six feet tall.

Photo by John Cely

Late in the summer, the plants' stems commonly become bright red, especially if growing in the sun. The young berries, first green and hard, swell, becoming a lustrous purple-black, marvelously shiny. The mature berries are full of juice and a number of seeds. The juice has been used as a sort of dye for fabrics or even "war paint" for young renegades...but be warned: this juice really can stain your clothing or skin! Various bird species don't mind eating these succulent fruits, and you can often see the purplish windshield trails and splotches provided by our avian friends.

This common plant is a weed most often found in sunny places that have been recently disturbed. It is fairly common throughout the eastern United States and eastern Canada.

Answer to last week's mystery plant

Cardinal flower, red betty, lobelia cardinalis

Dr. John Nelson is the curator of the USC Herbarium.

To learn more about the Herbarium, call him at

777-8196. His department also offers free plant identification.

www.herbarium.org