The Original Mystery Plant
Photo by Claudia Wanner

May is my favorite month because it seems to be a bit milder and has less storms.

The yellow jessamine is finished blooming, but the magnolias are blooming. There's a sweet fragrance in the air on these quiet mornings, plenty of birds singing, and there's a nest in every bush. There is also a good mix of spring and early summer flowers to study.

Once June arrives, it warm up and a large part of the landscape will enter its high green phase, which means there will be foliage but not as many flowers.

May boasts some of the prettiest wildflowers and some of the most fragrant. This week's Mystery Plant is a show- stopper in both departments.

It is an herb that rises from a buried rhizome. Its aerial stem produces one or two slender, pointed, dark green leaves sheathing at the base. The leaf blade is prominently veiny, and flowers appear regularly at the beginning of May.

A raceme of flowers is characteristic, each flower hanging from a slender stalk and on one side of the raceme. The fully developed corolla of the flower is bowl- shaped with six fused, snow- white petals.

Six tiny stamens and a single pistil may be found within. The fruits that are produced are small, reddish berries. The flowers are remarkably fragrant, and one or two stalks of blossoms in a vase can fill a room with the delicate, spicy sweetness.

This plant is a member of the lily family, and it is a distant cousin to Solomon's- seal and to garden monkey- grass. Most botanists agree this species is made up of three different, but closely similar, varieties. The varieties differ enough that they can be separated according to technical features, and the varieties have their own separate geographic distributions.

This plant is the European variety, which tends to form dense clumps, and has been widely grown in gardens. It has spread over large parts of the eastern United States, mostly toward New England. The North American variety is hardly distinguishable and is quite fragrant but tends not to form dense colonies. It is most likely to be seen in rich woods in the mountains from West Virginia to Georgia. The third variety is restricted to Japan and China.

This photo was taken by a friend of mine who lives near Paris. In France, the plant is called muguet and is traditionally sold on street corners as a fragrant good- luck token for friends to exchange in May. Answer to this week's mystery plant

[Answer: "Lily of the valley," Convallaria majalis]

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

To learn more about the Herbarium, call 777-8196. The

department also offers free plant identification.

www.herbarium.org