Photo by Jim Jung. All rights reserved.

Bellwort

Bellwort, named for its pendulous flowers (which supposedly resembles the uvula in the back of your throat), is beginning to bloom in our forests at this time. These graceful, eighteen inch plants with their seemingly sad and dispirited yellow blooms and drooping leaves are interesting but hardly spectacular. Relying on their Bumblebee pollinators these flowers are more interesting for the way they're pollinated - through "buzz" pollination - than for their actual blooms.

Unlike most flowers which readily yield pollen and nectar indiscriminately to all comers, buzz pollinated flowers only release theirs when tickled with the right sound frequency. A bumblebee (of the right species) has to enter the blossom, grasp the stigma and then vibrate their wings (they "buzz" inside the flower). The flower then sheds copious amounts of pollen all over the bee's body. Most of the pollen is collected and packed into the pollen baskets on the bee's hind legs - though of course they never get it all. When they visit the next bloom and repeat this performance any remaining pollen then pollinates the flower. Exactly why some flowers require this sort of buzzing to shed pollen is a mystery but it seems to work.

Apart from their idiosyncratic method of pollination this plant was used by Indians and settlers alike as food. The young shoots were gathered before they opened and steamed like asparagus. The upper parts of the plant were also considered effective for stomach problems and as a poultice for skin irritations. The roots were reputed to be effective in curing canker sores. And while all of these uses might have worked they apparently didn't work all that well since I know of no modern medicinal or food uses for this plant.

Offsite Links:

• Close-up of the blossom of Large Bellwort
• Related species, "Wild Oats"

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