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TWOLEAVED TOOTHWORT CRINKLEROOT
(Dentaria diphylla) Mustard family
Flowers - White, about 1/2 in. across, in a terminal loose
cluster, the formation of each similar to that of bulbous cress.
Stem: 8 to 15 in. high. Root stock: Long, crinkled, toothed,
fleshy, crisp, edible. Leaves: 2, opposite or nearly so, on the
stem, compounded of 3 ovate and toothed leaflets; also larger,
broader leaves on larger petioles from the rootstock. Fruit:
Flat, lance-shaped pods, 1 in. long or over, tipped with the
slender style.
Perferred Habitat - Rich leaf mould in woods, sometimes in
thickets and meadows.
Flowering Season - May.
Distribution - Nova Scotia to the Carolinas, west to the
Mississippi.
Clusters of these pretty, white, cross-shaped flowers, found near
the bloodroot, claytonia, anemones, and a host of other delicate
spring blossoms, enter into a short but fierce competition with
them for the visits of the small Andrena and Halictus bees then
flying to collect nectar and pollen for a generation still
unborn. In tunnels underground, or in soft, partially decayed
wood, each busy little mother places the pellets of pollen and
nectar paste, then when her eggs have been laid on the food
supply in separate nurseries and sealed up, she dies from
exhaustion, leaving her grub progeny to eat its way through the
larva into the chrysalis state, and finally into that of a winged
bee that flies away to liberty. These are the little bees so
constantly seen about willow catkins.
Country children, on their way to school through the woods, often
dig up the curious, long crisp root of the toothwort, which
tastes much like the water-cress, to eat with their sandwiches at
the noon recess. Then, as they examine the little pointed
projections on the rootstock, they see why the plant received its
name.
Another toothwort found throughout a similar range, the
CUT-LEAVED TOOTHWORT, or PEPPER-ROOT (D. laciniata), has its
equally edible rootstock scarcely toothed, but rather constricted
in places, giving its little tubers the appearance of beads
strung into a necklace. Its white or pale purplish-pink
cross-shaped flowers, loosely clustered at the end of an
unbranched stem, rise by preference above moist ground in rich
woods, often beside a spring, from April to June - a longer
season for wooing and working its insect friends than the
two-leaved toothwort has attained to - hence it is the commoner
plant. Instead of having two leaves on its stem, this species
spreads whorls of three leaves, thrice divided, almost to the
base, the divisions toothed or lobed, and the side ones sometimes
deeply cleft. The larger, longer petioled leaves that rise
directly from the rootstock have scarcely developed at flowering
time.
Next: SHEPHERD'S PURSE MOTHER'S HEART
Previous: SQUIRREL CORN
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