Wildflowers of Ainsworth: Mayapples

(Click on images to enlarge)

You could easily walk through a colony of Mayapples in the woods and not realize that they do blossom, because the flowers hang down below the big, umbrella-like leaves. I had to lie on the ground to get that picture above.

Here's a close-up of the blossom.



Mayapples bear fruit, although I've never seen it. It ripens in August or September. This year I will brave the mosquitoes to go into the woods at the end of summer and try to find some of the fruit, which I am told is an egg-shaped yellow berry. The immature fruit is poisonous, as is every other part of the plant. Jack Sanders says the Menominee and Iroquois people used it as an insecticide to kill potato bugs and corn worms. Also to commit suicide.

Among its folk names are devil's apple, wild lemon and Puck's foot.