The Original Mystery Plant

Photo by Will Stuart

South Carolina is known for its hot, humid summers. Historically, many southerners were able to deal with a hot summer by heading for the hills, as in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Of course, plants are unable to move around and must deal with their private landscape permanently. Although there are plenty of species in the South that love it hot and muggy, there are a number of strict mountain- lovers able to grow only at moderate to high elevations. The mystery plant is one of them.

It's a relative of the common mayapple, and like mayapple it's a member of the barberry family. It was described in 1803 by the famous botanist André Michaux.

The mystery plant grows in a very restricted geographic setting and is endemic where it occurs from northern Georgia through the mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina just into Virginia. This species will only be found on shaded slopes with a lot of shade and on very damp ground.

Sometimes it forms big colonies near the cool spray zones of waterfalls or along seepage slopes. These plants are up to 3' tall and commonly produce a single, large leaf, more or less circular, with its long stalk attached near the center of the blade, much like the handle of an umbrella.

The leaf blade is coarsely toothed around the edges. When the plants bloom, a different stem is produced, usually bearing two leaves each one deeply cleft on both sides. It's almost split down the middle.

The flowers appear in a cluster, each one stalked with about six petals. Blooming occurs in April and May. By late summer, each flower has produced a seedy berry, which is dark blue, and the associated fruit stalk becomes bright red.

Answer to this week's mystery plant [Answer: "Umbrella-leaf," Diphylleia cymosa]

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