August 24th, 2012

This flower is called “turtlehead”, it grows in the damp soil of the stream meadow at the Blair Outdoor Education Centre where I work.  Sometimes things are named for how they look or what they do- a blue jay is blue; a grasshopper hops in the grass.  And if you look closely, it doesn’t take much imagination to see the gaping maw of a turtle staring back at you.

Had I missed the August flowering period of this plant, I would still have known it grows amidst the goldenrod, Queen Anne’s Lace, Joe-Pye weed and other stream bank perennials.  I visit the same habitat in June in anticipation of the emergence of a butterfly called the Baltimore checkerspot.  Like the Baltimore oriole it is boldy coloured in contrasting black and orange.   Turns out it is the state insect of Maryland and both the butterfly and the bird are named after the first Lord Baltimore (George Calvert) whose family coat of arms included those colours.

Turtlehead is the host plant of the caterpillar of this species, so when the butterfly emerges from it’s chrysalis in spring, they feed on the nectar of Canada anemone and other spring flowers, seek a mate, and deposit their eggs in masses on the leaves of  – turtleheads!!  So seeing the butterfly assures one that the plant is predictably present.

In Maryland the checkerspot is now designated as S-3, or “watch-listed”, due to loss of habitat, overbrowsing of tutlehead by white-tailed deer, and predation by other insects and animals.  Here at home in Waterloo County it is designated as S-4, or “rare”, making the Blair Creek meadow a critical habitat.