Spring 2005
Jack-in-the-Pulpit
Preaching the Gospel of the Forest Floor
Photo by Conrad A. Gutraj/Root Resources. Spring for me had always been about the return of migratory birds. The first birds I would see always elevated my spirits. Thoughts of ruby-crowned kinglets, phoebes, vireos, and warblers are what sustained me through the winter.
All my excitement would be crushed, however, by a
cold, cloudy, or windy day. It was on one of these days,
with my head hung in disappointment, that I first really
noticed the forest floor — and
Jack-in-the-pulpit staring up at me.
I knew it immediately from its strange shape. The club-like spadix suggests a preacher ensconced in the pulpit, or leaf-like spathe. The spathe overhangs the Jack like a hood (this keeps the pollen on the tiny flowers at the base of the spadix from being washed away during spring rains).
So the common name makes perfect sense. Or does it? Mark Spreyer of the Stillman
Nature Center suggests renaming it Dennis-in-the-pulpit, after the
cross-dressing former Chicago Bulls forward. After all, an individual
plant can display male, female, or nonsexual traits in any given year.
“That is to say,” he comments, “one year’s Jack
may be next year’s Jill. If a large female has a few bad years
[or a great year of fruit production, using up stored resources], researchers
have
found that in the following year it may produce only one
leaf and flower as a male. The reverse is also true. Should that scrawny
male enjoy good
growing conditions, it can regain its status as a large,
multi-leaved female.” Since only large plants are likely to have
the energy required to produce berries (the female’s role), this
adaptation allows even the smaller plants to participate in reproduction
most years.
They’ll pay back the favor when they’re feeling strong enough to
be female.
Jack-in-the-pulpit’s scientific name is Arisaema
triphyllum. Arisaema has its roots in the Arabic word for fire. Triphyllum means “three
leaves,” though it actually refers to leaflets. Native American boys who
used to bite the root bulb as a rite of passage into manhood could attest
to the appropriateness of fire for the scientific name. In Poisonous
Plants of the U. S. and Canada, John Kingsbury says Jack-in-the-pulpit
forms “needle-like crystals of calcium oxalate, particularly in the
rhizome, which if taken into the mouth become embedded in the mucous membranes
and
provoke intense irritation and a burning sensation.” Simply
put, there are better things to eat.
Jack-in-the-pulpit can be seen in woods throughout Chicago Wilderness, anywhere buckthorn and garlic mustard have not choked it out. One of my favorite places to see this all-green relative of the Easter lily is in the woods adjacent to Wolf
Road Prairie, where I also have found the closely related, much rarer, and equally bizarre green
dragon.
Cultivating Jack-in-the-pulpit is not terribly difficult. I received the plants shipped as roots and planted them according to the simple instructions. Without sowing seeds or any further work, the number of plants doubled in about three years. They grow in moist areas with shade and will grow even in relatively poor soil. They come up a little later than many of the other woodland plants but last much longer.
Jack-in-the-pulpit lingers into the fall, with a display
perfectly timed for sore-necked birders. Its berries, which
form on a stalk, turn from green to bright red in September — just
as those confusing fall warblers are returning.
— Mel D. Tracy
Related articles
USDA Plant Profile for Jack-in-the-pulpit
Pictures and information from the Illinois Natural History Survey
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