Skunk Cabbage – Snow Melting Wizard of the Woods!

Time again to take a look at the wilder side of Oakland County!

I have been an unabashed admirer of skunk cabbage ever since I was a six-year -old  barefooted swamp- tromping adventurer in the backwoods of rural Connecticut.  Much has changed over the years, but as the first wafts of warm air excite us and chickadees sing their prelude to spring, I am once again in search of skunk cabbage, now armed with a compass, camera and an old mercury thermometer. There is far more to the wonders of skunk cabbage than meets the casual eye.

Skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus) is a common large-leafed plant of wooded wetlands.  Sometimes in summer, hundreds of the skunk cabbage plants in the same habitat create great carpets of green-hued shade for wood frogs, salamanders and insects of every shape and size.  When the leaves are crushed or bruised they emit a pungent odor that bears resemblance to the aroma of a skunk.img_5284

A walk in the woods of March opens the door to witnessing something truly amazing; the snow-melting ability of this wooded wetland wizard of the plant world.    Skunk cabbage creates its own heat and a gently inserted thermometer confirms what botanists have discovered; the temperature inside the flower head remains almost 20-30 degrees warmer than that of the outside air temperature during the season of snow melt.   A keen-eyed observer of the natural world will discover the emerging hood -like leaves that enclose the hidden flowers of the skunk cabbage actually melt the snow and ice around the plant creating small circles of green on the forest floor.  Not many hikers travel with a thermometer  but a  finger resting against the inner sides of the cavity that is formed by the spathe ( a  leaf-like bract that encloses a flower cluster) will detect  heat created by the breaking down of organic substances within the plant while using oxygen.    In 1974 Biologist Roger Knutson discovered that skunk cabbage regulates warmth in much the same manner as a warm-blooded mammal.img_5293

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At age six I was in love with the skunk cabbage for its “stink”. That love affair continues today. I take great pleasure in sitting silently on woodland hillside next to small creek near a patch of emerging skunk cabbage. I admire their deep maroon or sometime reddish spiraled hoods with occasional dramatic dashes of yellow and watch a secret world unfold.  Sometimes I see tiny insects climb or fly into the hidden micro-climate of plant produced warmth while the rest of the hillside remains laced in crunchy snow.  Whether they enter for warmth or for pollination is a mystery they keep to themselves. But what I do know is this: the secret life of skunk cabbage lets me be a kid again; thirsty for more natural world wonders to unfold.

Text and photos by Jonathan Schechter, Nature Education Writer-Oakland County Parks  www.oakgov.com/parks

8 thoughts on “Skunk Cabbage – Snow Melting Wizard of the Woods!

  1. […] Skunk cabbage is the earliest flowering plant to emerge in the waning days of winter, and it usually does so by poking up through crusty snow and thick layers of ground frost by turning up its thermostat. Skunk cabbage is ‘thermogenic’- meaning it creates heat. When its internal furnace fires up, the surrounding snow melts from the radiating warmth. In a “normal” winter, an odd circle of bare ground, free of snow, surrounds the plant. The melt zone is from heat generated by the plant, making it easy to spot it from a distance. If a finger is gently inserted into the spathe, the ‘hood’ around the flower head, the warmth is palatable. How warm? Fifteen to thirty degrees warmer than the surrounding air! Sit patiently to watch a skunk cabbage plant during the waning days of winter and a secret micro-climate world will unfold, causing another abundance of distractions: small insects, spiders, flies, and moths attracted to this warm oasis of life. […]

  2. […] Skunk cabbage has emerged at the edges of meandering creeks deep within our woodlands. Skunk cabbage is a “thermogenic” plant and is capable of thawing frozen soil and melting snow; it even produces flowers before leaves emerge. Research has shown that their emerging flowers have the capacity to produce metabolic heat approximately 15 degrees to 35 degrees Fahrenheit above the ambient temperature, thus causing the strange open circles of snow around the plant. What do those circles tell me? Skunk cabbage behaves in some ways like a warm-blooded animal, giving it a head start in growth at the dawn of spring! […]

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