Jack-in-the-pulpit, Laudholm Farms, Wells ME

My photographer friend Robert, who lives in Australia, liked yesterday’s picture of a Pink Lady Slipper, because it was a chance to see a plant he only sees “caged” (his word) growing in its natural habitat. Until yesterday, though it is native to Maine, I had only ever seen the Jack-in-the-pulpit, so to speak, in “captivity”…at the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens in Booth Bay Maine, and at Wild Gardens of Acadia at Sieur de Mont Springs in Acadia National Park. You can imagine my surprise, and delight, when I looked down off the edge of the boardwalk yesterday at the Wells National Estuarine Research Center at Laudholm Farm in Wells Maine and caught sight of the unmistakable hood of a Jack-in-the-pulpit. It was almost completely buried in its own foliage, and in the foliage of other plants growing with it. Further investigation showed 4 Jack-in-the-pulpit plants (also called bog onion, brown dragon, Indian turnip, American wake robin, or wild turnip) in a cluster within a foot of the boardwalk. I kept my eye peeled, and found another cluster of five plants, similarly placed, before I came to the end of the long boardwalk. The second cluster, two of which are shown above, were younger, with the leaves not completely unfolded and the hood stripped inside and out and lower on the jack. The first cluster were mature plants, fully flowered with the hood completely green on the outside and drying at little at the tip.

Jack-in-the-pulpit

According to the wiki article, the Jack is actually covered in tiny, both male and female, flowers. The male flowers on any one plant dominate early and then die, leaving more female flowers, so the plant is not self pollinating. I also read that it takes 3 years for the plant to mature enough to flower for the first time, so these Jacks have been growing beside the boardwalk for at least that long. There is more in the wiki, and as you might suspect from some of the alternate names, the tuber of the plant is edible…and has been used in traditional herbal medicine.

Finding a something new to me in nature always delights me. To know that I have walked by these plants for at least 3 years, and to have finely “chanced” on them, is simply wonderful…so wonderful that I totally reject the notion that there was any “chance” involved. I could so easily have walked by them again this year. To have found them is a gift outright, an undeserved and unearned gift, the very definition of a blessing. And “wonderful” too in the literal sense of the word…filling me with wonder…with that sense of awe at the beauty of nature and the love of the creator. That they are there is wonderful…to have found them, to have been lead to glance down just at the right second, is awesome! And then to be rewarded with a second cluster…such love!

And now I get to share them with you! How awesome is that? Happy Sunday!

All photos Nikon P900 in Close Up Mode. 80-100mm equivalent field of view. Processed in Lightroom and the panel assembled in Coolage.