The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1889-08-03
The SIERRA SNOW PLANT.
.utifnl Flower Found on the Noun
tain Heights of the West.


Deautifnl Flower Found on the Noun
tain Heights of the West.
one thing that never fails to interest
al VINO see it, when alone it is found
on sne mountain heights of the Sierras,
Is snesnow plant, known to botanists
as the Sarcodes Sanguinea, meaning
oiooaed flesh. Both names are said to
% msnomers. The first was given it
from Its supposed birth among the
oierfa snow, some travellers asserting
that hsent its roots into snowbanks as
ptnef plants into earth. Superficial
observers were deceived by seeing the
brilliant spikes of flowers rising from
tne snow that had fallen around them
IN snequick mountain squalls after the
plants had grown. No flesh or blood
couid be as exquisitely beautiful; imag-
Inc q rosy and snow tented, crowded
pyaclnth, from eight to twenty inches in
nelght every miniature bell wound
aooutby rosy and frosted silver rib
pon'al topped by a huge head of aspar-
agus In boar frost and silver The
frosRd papilla is very marked on every
sepa and bract. Though the whole
translucent spike is flushed with rose
and armine, the petals are the deepest
and most brilliantly colored parts OF
the lower, which is five parted, and
each open one showing slightly the
SkRns and pistils. There have been
q Aecimens bearing eighty perfect
newsstand a pseudo-bulb twenty-five
inches In circumference. brittle almost
as sluAglass, and although solid as a
plneople when first dug up, dried
awayto the size of the stem. All at
tempt at cultivation have thus far
falled'ae bulbs refusing to stand trans
plantlnland the seeds to sprout. For
the malwho can discover the way to
1ntroducthem to cultivation there is a
fortune hstore, and what glorious
addition Thy will be to our early gar
den flora! they have been gathered in
their natlvevilds from May until past
the middle July, but even at home
are said to e capricious in growth
Localities whee they abound one sea-
son may be Without them the next.
They are foun as high as 5000 feet
| above the sea leel and not much below
1000. 1t was one said that they would
not survive belU the level of the sum-
mer snow line, but they have been
since seen almosi covering the ground
far below. The aowbanks seem, how
ever. to protect hem from the winds
sweeping among the mountains, and
they make their e,rly growth and de-
velopment beneath the driven SHOWS,
and when the approach of summer
leaves the surface If the ground ex-
posed it is covered ia few days with
the red crowns of the snow plants. The
flowers are at first protected by the
leaf-like bracts, which gradually un.
fold as the weather warns and appar-
emily close up again when the temper.
AZURE becomes suddenly cold. When
thus closed the parts of the flower are
SO perfectly fitted together as to resem.
BILE a huge head of asparagus. The
brittle roots extend into the ground al
sstast as far as the flower does above it
Although once thought to be parasitic
upon decaying cedar roots, no indica
lions of parasitic character are found
upon digging them up. The plant i:
said to be found in soils of varying ma
ture, but always where it gets the water
from melting snow. Perhaps some new
system of refrigeration will be dis
covered by which the bulbs may b.
transported to other regions. -Ameri
can Garden.