By Ken Moore
Be on the lookout for a multi-stemmed shrub that appears to be decorated with pendulous, 4-to-6-inch strips of yellow yarn. If you examine these streamers closely, gently tap several of them. You’ll be surprised by the clouds of pollen. The streamers are staminate catkins, which are pendulous clusters of petalless male flowers providing pollen for the much-less-obvious petalless female flowers.
The challenge of this botany lesson is to find the female flowers. You’ll have to look closely to find tiny swollen buds with clusters of rosy red threads protruding from the bud tips. These short red threads are the stigmas of the hidden female flowers. The exposed stigmas catch the passing pollen that is required for those flowers to produce hazelnuts.
Yep, you’ve guessed it, that shrub is American Hazelnut, Corylus Americana, and yes, they are quite tasty, but the wild critters usually beat us to the feast. We must rely on the orchards of Eurasian hazelnut species for the tasty nuts we purchase in stores.
Hazelnut is a common large woodland shrub in our forests, but it is most noticeable growing along woodland edges and sewer and power-line rights-of-way where the additional sunlight promotes heavy flower and nut production.
Another common shrub, similar in appearance to the hazelnut, is Tag Alder, Alnus serrulata. You will commonly find it along stream banks and pond edges. It likes to have its feet in the water. Tag Alder catkins are not quite as long as those of hazelnuts. The easiest way to distinguish between the two shrubs is to spot clusters of what appear to be miniature pine cones. The little cones of the Tag Alder are generally one-half-inch long. They remain on the branches well into the second year. Your second challenge here, as with the hazelnut, is to locate the small swollen buds of the female flowers with red stigma threads reaching out for wind-borne Tag Alder pollen.
Now you’re ready for your botany quiz. Why don’t these early- spring-flowering natives have showy petals? Reflect for a bit. Our early Piedmont springs are intermingled with our late Piedmont winters and native plants have devised cleaver strategies for success in the on-again, off-again cold weather. These plants don’t waste energy producing showy flowers to attract insect pollinators. Early-spring temperatures are too cold for significant insect activity, so these plants depend on the wind to assist in pollination. Flower petals, in addition to wasting plant energy, would simply get in the way of wind pollination.
Taking a close-up look at the beauty of petalless flowers is a pure delight; it makes me feel like I’ve never had a better day! I hope you will make your day better with a closer look. Better yet, take your kids and friends out with you and give them a better day by sharing your closer look at nature’s subtler beauties.