If you have never made a flower calendar, buy a notebook and begin at once. You need not wait for spring flowers to come; for although that is the best time to begin, there are flowers blooming all the year round, even in winter, if one is brave enough to look for them. The first visitor in my neighborhood is the skunk cabbage. Before its leaves have the cour age to show themselves, the purple hoods push their way above the cold, marshy soil of their home. You must look inside SKUNK CABBAGE of the hoods to find the flowers. They grow in dense clusters upon a short stem, and although each flower is very tiny, it has four flower leaves, four stamens and one pistil. The purple or mottled hood protects them from the cold of early spring. The leaves wait for warmer weather, but they grow very rapidly when they start, some of them getting to be two feet long. They are heart-shaped and very showy. You have probably seen them often. The leaves, flowers and fruit of the plant all have an unpleasant odor, which accounts for its name. It belongs, though, to the same family as the beautiful calla lily and your friend Jack-in-thepulpit. I shall not tell you about the other flowers in my calendar, for they come when the weather is warm enough for you to go out to see them, and to find out about them for yourselves. WHEN? "TELL me, when will the mayflower come? "When will the grasses show their shoots? again?" As soon as they feel within their roots The pulse of the warm spring rain. "When will the crocus push through the mold? When will the robins begin to build? |