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TRUMPET
(Datura stramonium) Potato family
Flowers - Showy, large, about 4 in. high, solitary, erect,
growing from the forks of branches. Calyx tubular, nearly half as
long as the corolla, 5-toothed, prismatic; corolla funnel-form,
deep-throated, the spreading limb 2 in. across or less, plaited,
5-pointed; stamens 5; 1 pistil. Stem: Stout, branching, smooth, 1
to 5 ft. high. Leaves: Alternate, large, rather thin, petioled,
egg-shaped in outline, the edges irregularly wavy-toothed or
angled, rank-scented. Fruit: A densely prickly, egg-shaped
capsule, the lower prickles smallest. The seeds and stems contain
a powerful narcotic poison.
Preferred Habitat - Light soil, fields, waste land near
dwellings, rubbish heaps.
Flowering Season - June-September.
Distribution - Nova Scotia to the Gulf of Mexico, westward beyond
the Mississippi.
When we consider that there are over five million Gypsies
wandering about the globe, and that the narcotic seeds of the
thorn apple, which apparently heal, as well as poison, have been
a favorite medicine of theirs for ages, we can understand at
least one means of the weed reaching these shores from tropical
Asia. (Hindoo, dhatura). Our Indians, who call it "white man's
plant," associate it with the Jamestown settlement - a plausible
connection, for Raleigh's colonists would have been likely to
carry with them to the New World the seeds of an herb yielding an
alkaloid more esteemed in the England of their day than the
alkaloid of opium known as morphine. Daturina, the narcotic, and
another product, known in medicine as stramonium, smoked by
asthmatics, are by no means despised by up-to-date practitioners.
Were it not for the rank odor of its leaves, the vigorous weed,
coarse as it is, would be welcome in men's gardens. Indeed, many
of its similar relatives adorn them. The fragrant petunia and
tobacco plants of the flower beds, the potato, tomato, and
egg-plant in the kitchen garden, call it cousin.
Late in the afternoon the plaited corolla of this long
trumpet-shaped flower expands to welcome the sphinx moths. So
deep a tube implies their tongues; not that these are the
benefactors to which the blossom originally adapted itself - they
were doubtless left behind in Asia - but apparently our moths
make excellent substitutes, for there is no abatement of the
weed's vigor here, as there surely would be did it habitually
fertilize itself. Any time after four o'clock in the afternoon,
according to the light, the sphinx moth, a creature of the
gloaming, begins its rounds, to be mistaken for a hummingbird
seven times out of ten. Hovering about its chosen white or yellow
flowers, that open for it at the approach of twilight, it remains
poised above one a second, as if motionless - although the faint
hum of its wings, while sucking, indicates that no magic suspends
it - then darts swift as thought to another deep tube to feast
again, of course transferring pollen as it goes. But what if the
Jamestown weed miscalculate the hour of her lover's call and open
too soon? Mischievous bees, quick to seize so golden an
opportunity, squeeze into the flower when it begins to unfold
(flies and beetles following them), to steal pollen, which will
sometimes be entirely removed before the moth's arrival.
The THORN-APPLE [now PURPLE THORN-APPLE, considered a variant of
JIMSONWEED]; PURPLE STRAMONIUM (D. tatula), a similar species,
usually with darker leaves, and pale lavender or violet flowers,
or with its long, slender tube white, has become at home in so
many fields and waste lands east of Minnesota and Texas that no
one thinks of it as belonging to tropical America.
Only sphinx moths can reach its deep well of nectar, from which
bees are literally barred out by an inward turn of the stamens
toward the center of the tube. Caterpillars of our commonest
member of the sphinx tribe conceal themselves on the tomato vine
by a mimicry of its color so faultless that a bright eye only may
detect their presence. In the South the caterpillar of another of
these moths (Sphinx Carolina) does fearful havoc under its
appropriate alias of "tobacco worm."
Next: CULVER'SROOT CULVER'S PHYSIC
Previous: JIMSONWEED JAMESTOWN WEED THORN APPLE STRAMONIUM DEVIL'S
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