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- We saw it in great profusion along the Meander River handy Smileys Provincial Park (West Hants), just across the road up from the bridge along the small flood plain. The jack-in-the-pulpit is of the arum family. There are three trillium-like leaves; just beneath, the flower grows. It consists of a curving ridged and striped hood (the spathe), the "pulpit." This ridged hood is green or purplished-brown and envelopes an erect club (spadix), this, of course, is "Jack." In the late summer or fall "Jack" turns into a cluster of shiny red berries. As indicated, jack-in-the-pulpit, prefers damp alluvial soils. Jack-in-the-pulpit is rarely found along the Atlantic coast.
The aboriginals would like to gather the roots (corms) for food. They can be bitter if eaten raw (calcium ozate crystals); but cooked, they are represented to be OK. (Audubon.) (By way of editorial comment: certainly, these days, one cannot recommend the gathering up of these delicate and relatively rare plants for the purposes of food; one should, as a general rule, just look at and take pictures of wild flowers; for food, go to the grocery store; for flowers go to the floral stores; and for medicine, go to your doctor.)
- We saw it in great profusion along the Meander River handy Smileys Provincial Park (West Hants), just across the road up from the bridge along the small flood plain. The jack-in-the-pulpit is of the arum family. There are three trillium-like leaves; just beneath, the flower grows. It consists of a curving ridged and striped hood (the spathe), the "pulpit." This ridged hood is green or purplished-brown and envelopes an erect club (spadix), this, of course, is "Jack." In the late summer or fall "Jack" turns into a cluster of shiny red berries. As indicated, jack-in-the-pulpit, prefers damp alluvial soils. Jack-in-the-pulpit is rarely found along the Atlantic coast.
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_______________________________Peter Landry
2011 (2019)