August 20
Jack in the Pulpit (Arisaema
triphyllum)
Cranefly Orchid (Tipularia
discolor)
By late summer
the pale green flower of Jack in the Pulpit (seen in an
earlier painting, May 13) has withered away except for the
cluster of berries which start out green but ripen to a
bright red.
When I looked for a specimen to paint, I selected the most
interesting and colorful cluster. It included a few green
and orange berries, immature but the same size as the red
ones. After painting them I stood back and realized they
looked like a bunch of M & M candies instead of the
typically all red clusters. I redid my painting to
illustrate a cluster one would be more likely to find, with
insignificant immature berries. In botanical illustration,
one needs to resist painting the most extraordinary or
unusual--as interesting or as beautiful as that might
be--and provide, instead, a realistic means of
identification. These red seeds could be planted right away
for blooms the third year. With plenty of moisture, Jack in
the Pulpit can be over three feet tall, but in ordinary
rich woods it will be smaller.
In those same woods you may find Cranefly Orchid blooming,
but you’ll have to look for them because their mauve and
beige color blends into the leaves on the ground. (Ground
clutter in the painting includes beech, maple, pine,
sourwood, sweet gum, and tulip poplar.) Cranefly
Orchid’s
single leaf is
illustrated in another of my paintings, that of the
Cranefly Orchid leaf (February 28), but it disappears
before summer and nothing is there until the leafless stalk
of little orchids comes up by itself in late summer. You
must get on your hands and knees to really see the orchids.
So, if you have several stems, pick a few to put in an
empty perfume bottle near your telephone and enjoy them
there. A leaf comes up later, for the winter. The dark
green on top, and magenta underneath, is very pretty in the
snow.
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for a larger image)
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