The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1893-04-14
THE FLORA OF UTAH.
Professor Jones Says We Have 5000
Varieties of Plants.
A Botanists Description of Some of the
Beautiful Flowers to Be Found
Throughout the Territory.

When you write to your friends tell
them that Utah has twice as many wild
flowers as all the Mississippi valley put
together.
That will sound big, like an advertise
ment.
But how many persons really love
flowers?
80, I dearly love flowers, - is the spon-
taneous gush that is SO commonly heard
But flowers are rapidly becoming a
marketable commodity, like rutabagos
and onions. Women buy them in
lunches and wear them for the sake Of
making show. The showiest kind are
most sought after; those that are ''loud'
enough to be seen across the parquette,
on first nights.
Men rarely care anything for flowers,
except to attract attention. How many
men nestle q flower in secret. 1t is
all very pretty and impressive ito wear
them in the button-hole and never be
seen without them. 1t looks tender and
refined. But the men who wear rosebnds
are not always the ones that care for them
most.
Did you ever see Professor Jones with
bud in his button hole?
Seldom, if ever.
Then you conclude that Marcus E.
Jones is Indifferent to the beauty of
flowers.
How apt you are to judge men simply
by appearances. Professor Jones loves
flowers as the blossoms of the sweetest
things that grow. He likes them SO we'll,
that when boy, he studied their habits
and learned their names.
1t is not known whether the professor
ever bought dozen roses in his life, and
yet he is going to write big book on the
fora of Utah.
When HERALD reporter heard OF this
he asked the professor several questions
about the wild flowers of Utah.
s'The fora of Utah, - said the profess
sor, care entirely different from those of
any other region. You see very few
plants here that belong to the Mississippi
valley, while those of Colorado are quite
les on the east and the seeds seldom are
blown across those snowclad ranges Of the
big divide. Neither do our flowers re-
semble those of the Pacific slope.
1--WE have twice as many varieties as
there are to be found in the entire Missis-
siDpi Valley. The reason of this is ow-
ing to our high mountains, low valleys
and desert regions, all varying IN soil
and climate. There are over 5000 differ
clb AIIOS VI llidAbo III ivan, oAAASC
SIS many as in the middle-western states"
ssWhich OF the Utah wild flowers is the
greatest favorite?''
The wild sego has been voted the
handsomest, and we must accept this
| Judgment as q final test of its popularity.
| 1t is lily. about foot high, and occurs
through the entire territory. There is
another variety OF sego that grows in
Southern Utah that has pure white
flower, with purple and yellow centre.
! The standing cyprus is the handsomest
In some respects. 1t grows about two
feet high and has red, white or spotted
flowers; all three varieties sometimes
grow on the same plant.
The evening primrose IS beautiful. 1t
has flower six inches in diameter. 1t is
magnificent plant, and the flower is
white. 1t blooms at night and is best
seen in the early morning.
Johnson's primrose has gold and yellow
flowers, and is fully as fine as the others.
1t grows in western Utah.
"Flowers grow most abundant in the
Big Cottonwood. l gathered 1, 100 differ
emf varieties there in six weeks In 1873,
being the first year / botanized IN Utah.
| Mr.. Jones said that he had completed
the field work, having gathered all the
dates. but that it viii take him a year to
prepare il for the press.
This is the first attempt ever made to
write book on the flora of Utah.
Prof. Jones has been in Utah fourteen
wears. He came here from Iowa, but he
is native of the Buckeye state.