Skunk Cabbage

Skunk Cabbage Sumplocarpus foetidus Arum family
We went out searching for the skunk-cabbage, there is a swampy area where they are prevalent and we discover them just beginning to push their heads up above the boggy earth.
24” Shell-like 6” spathe, mottled brownish purple and green encloses knob-like spadix covered with tiny flowers. Leaves very large, cabbage-like, veined; unfurl from tight roll after flowering. Smells like decaying meat, attracts pollinating insects. From Audubon Society Field Guide to New England.
The first plant that shows the influence of the changing season in this part of the country is very little like the delicate snow-drop, or the fragrant violet of other lands. Long before the earliest trees are in bud, or the grass shows the faintest tinge of green, the dark spathe of the skunk-cabbage makes its way in the midst of snow and ice. It is singular that at a moment when the snow is generally frost-bound, any plant should find out that spring is at hand; but toward the close of February, or beginning of March, the skunk-cabbage makes a good guess at the time of the year, and comes up in marshy spots, on the banks of ponds and streams. With us it is almost a winter plant. The dark spathe or sheath is quite handsome, variegated, when young, with purple, light green, and yellow; within it grows the spadix, not unlike a miniature pineapple in shape and color, and covered with little protuberances, from each of which opens a purple flower. Although a very common plant, many persons familiar with its broad glossy leaves in summer have never seen the flower, and have no idea how early it blossoms. Its strong, offensive odor is better known; an American botanist has observed that “it is exceedingly meritorious of the name it bears; “ but this seems too severs, since a harsher thing could not well be said of a plant. – Susan Fenimore Cooper "Rural Hours", entry for March 24,

I am greatly enjoying Rural Hours which is a journal from the late 1840's.