Beautiful Bloodroot--Spring must be here!
Have you ever wondered why some spring-blooming plants are called "spring ephemerals?" Spring ephemerals live their entire life cycle very quickly, using stored energy from their roots (often a corm or bulb) to send up leaves and a bloom that is relatively large and showy compared to the size of the plant. Those large, often showy blooms provide pollen or nectar for hungry, early season pollinators. Once pollinated, they complete their reproductive cycle, and at that point many spring ephemerals have exhausted their supply of energy for the year. They then die back and rest until the following spring. The plants with this fleeting appearance every spring have been dubbed "ephemerals."
Bloodroot, Sanguinaria canadensis, is one of the very earliest to bloom, so let’s begin there!
Bloodroot is small, only about 6” tall, with a large, white flower and beautifully textured, sea green leaves. It is pollinated by native bees (mining bees and sweat bees) if and when the weather is warm enough. The flowers provide no nectar—the bees are attracted to their pollen.
But this plant also has a backup plan and can self-pollinate if the bees are not out yet—a good strategy for such an early blooming plant, in areas where spring weather can be fickle (what? our spring weather? fickle?)
Bloodroot spreads by rhizomes. But here this clever plant also has another backup strategy. It has persuaded native ants to carry its seeds around and plant them, along with some ideal fertilizer, in a nice dark hole at just the right depth for germination. Bloodroot does this by encapsulating its seeds in a tasty, nutritious substance that ants covet. The ants will take the seeds back down into their nest, eat the outer covering, defecate (providing fertilizer) near the cast-away seeds, and move on, leaving the bloodroot seeds to germinate and potentially create a new population.
Spring ephemerals can be tricky to grow. Even more so than with other wildflowers, you really must match them to a site they are well suited for. If you have shade, especially afternoon shade, and moist but well-draining soil, (meaning not heavy clay), you might stand a good chance. But Bloodroot, in particular, prefers neutral to alkaline soil—a fact that I learned only after researching why several plantings in my moist, forested (but acidic!) landscape in the Catoctin mountains gradually dwindled and disappeared.
If you buy Bloodroot and you want to support pollinators, please avoid the double-blossom variety. There is pretty good evidence that many native cultivars selected for double-blossom or for changed color my not have the same pollen or nectar value for pollinators.
Several readers have been asking for more ideas for shade. I am working on a new, larger online course that I hope will be very useful…stay tuned!
Also, now that the plants are up, this is a great time to schedule a consult. Click here to learn more about what a consult is like, and/or get in touch with me.
Happy Spring!
Chris