Mountain Death Camas is also sometimes called Poison Camas, Poison Sego, Alakali Grass, White Camas, Wand Lily, and Death Camas. These common names elude to the poisonous compounds found in this lily.
The scientific name elegans means elegant. It is a beautiful, flowing plant even though it its highly poisonous. The genus contains plants with alkaloids toxic to both man and livestock. Sheep are frequently affected, since they seem to eat the plants more readily than other animals do. Hogs are said to be immune to the poison. Poisoning usually occurs in early spring because the death camases appear before most other range plants and their succulent leaves are available.
Make sure not to confuse this plant with the true Camas, which formed a stable food for Indians of the Northwest. The flowers are quite different, but Indians did occasionally mistake bulbs of the two, since both plants grow together in meadows. It is difficult to distinguish death camases from onions, sego lilies, fritillaries, and wild hyacinths when the edible plants are only a few inches high. However, a combination of leaf characters and a cross section of the bulbs or corms is diagnostic at any stage in the development of the plants.
Detailed Description
Flowers: 3/8 of an inch long, saucer-like, to .75 inches wide, in racemes, with 6 white tepals (petals and sepals that are undifferentiated) and 6 stamen. The flowers are arranged in a raceme (spiraling around a central stalk). Leaves: Basal, linear, and smooth, with parallel veins Habitat: Death Camas grows in areas along streams and in forest clearings and meadows from about 6000 to 12000 feet in the mountains. It has a wide distribution from Alaska to New Mexico and from Nevada west to Minnesota. In Colorado it can be found flowering from June to August.
It would be easy to describe Miconia (Miconia calvescens) as the scariest weed in the Pacific islands. Imagine an herbaceous looking plant that grows purplish leaves nearly 6 feet long. It can grow to 50 feet tall. In wet forests it grows quickly and can take over a forest, choking out other plants. Now imagine a giant hillside that Miconia has taken over. The shallow roots of Miconia don’t stabilize the soil though. Eventually, this hillside could collapse in a giant mudslide. It’s a story all too familiar to Tahitians and something Hawaiians want to stop before it gets to that stage.
Distribution
Miconia is native to Central and South America but has been introduced to various othe places, including many of the Pacific Islands. It was introduced to the Islands of Hawaii in 1960. It was reported wild in in 1982.
While this enormous, melastomacous plant is fairly restricted in range on Maui and the Big Island, it is top on the list of weeds to get rid of. A few plants have been found on Oahu and Kauai and a great deal of effort has been made to exterminate them.
General Description
Miconia is easily recognized. Like most other melastomacous plants, it has 3 prominent veins that run longitudinally from the stem leaf to the leaf tip. The leaf is hairy, and the undersides are reddish-purple. The leaves are opposite.
Spathoglottis plicata is known commonly as the Malayan Ground Orchid and the Philippine Ground Orchid. It grows natively in southeast Asia and surrounding islands. One of the most common places to see it is in the islands of Hawaii. It was introduced to the islands sometime before 1929 by Harold Lyon, the head of what eventually became the Lyon Arboretum (in Manoa Valley, just behind Waikiki).
Today the Malayan Ground Orchid is one of the most common orchids you’ll see in the Hawaiian Islands. It can be seen as you hike through wetter streams and along the edge of waterfalls on all the islands. Its purple flowers will quickly stop a hiker as few Hawaiian forests don’t generally have many showy flowers in bloom.
Diversity of Orchids in Hawaii
The casual tourist might assume that Hawaii is a mecca of wild orchids. Yet there were only a couple native orchids found here. This isn’t totally unfathomable, however, when you take into account the fact that most orchids form tight relationships with particular insect pollinators. For an orchid to successfully colonize the islands it would need a successful seed to germinate here in addition to having its insect pollinator. Thus, the only species to have made it here were orchids with a generalized insect pollinator. While the Malayan Ground Orchid is not one of Hawaii’s native species, it is one of the most common.
On the very top of the mountains of Oahu and the extremely wet peaks of Mt. Waialeale on Kauai lives a tree that Western US hikers might think was a relative of aspen trees. While unrelated, the tree known as Lapalapa resembles Quaking Aspen trees because of the nature of the petiole, the connection of the leaf to the stem. The petioles are flattened which makes the leaves flap in the wind. Some might even say the make a “lapping” sound. Thus, the Hawaiian name for the plant is a kind of onomatopoeia.
Distribution
‘Lapalapa is a name that generally refers to one of 6 species in the genus Cheirodendron. Five of those species are endemic to the Hawaiian Islands. Four of those are sometimes referred to as ‘Olapa, while C. platyphyllum is often referred to as ‘Lapalapa. Its only found in very wet forests of Kauai and Oahu. It’s a fairly common tree however, when you get to these wet regions. It’s also one of the most easily distinguished trees because of its leaves.
General Description
This species is a small tree that rarely reaches 30 feet in height. The leaves are opposite and palmately compound. The leaflets of ‘Lapalapa are broader than they are long. Fruit is dark purple.
Interesting Facts
While we haven’t tested this, ‘Lapalapa wood apparently burns when its green. Thus, it was an important tree for Hawaiians that were forced to spend the night in the cold and wet upland forests.
The fruit, leaves, and bark of these trees were used to make a bluish dye for staining kapa cloth. The leaves were used in Hawaiian leis. When the tree is cut it gives off a strong carrot-like odor. This odor was used to scent mamaki kapa.
Leucaena leucocephala is native to tropical America where it grows in dry forests. In Hawaii the plant is known as koa haole and is a great example of an alien pest species in Hawaii. The name likely came from its resemblance to the other native tree in the bean family, koa, and haole, alluding to its introduction by white foreigners.
Description
Koa haole is a sturdy shrub or small tree that can reach almost 30 feet tall. The flowering heads (infloresences) resemble white globules that are about one inch in diameter. In reality, these tiny globules are actually composed of many small flowers with white petals. The leaves are pinnately compound with many leaflets. The plant produces several thin pods that surround small brown seeds.
Kahili Ginger (Hedychium gardnerianum) is a large ginger native to the Himalayan region. In optimal growing conditions it can reach eight feet tall. This plant produces beautiful yellow inflorescences that make it one of the most widely cultivated species of ginger. It can be grown in tropical regions and somewhat subtropical climates.
Problems in Hawaii
Kahili ginger is one of Hawaii’s worst noxious weeds. It is particularly invasive in Kauai, such as in Koke’e. However, it has not invaded the small island of Molokai yet. Hawaii shares its conservation concerns with New Zealand, where the plant has become a pest as well.
The Indian lotus (Nelumbo nucifera) is also known as the Sacred Lotus and the Bean of India. It is a valuable plant in Asia because of its edible roots and showy flowers. It is often planted in gardens as a perennial ornamental.
Long-lasting seeds
The seeds of the Indian Lotus can remain dormant for many years. In fact, the seeds of a 1300-year-old lotus seed was germinated from a dry lake bed in northeastern China. To germinate the seeds artificially the seed coat must be nicked and then allowed to absorb moisture.
National Flower
The Indian Lotus is the national flower of Indian and Vietnam.
This bright yellow flower has special significance to the people of the Hawaiian Islands. It is the official flower of the Island of O’ahu. It was the flower of choice for leis by Hawaiian Royalty, but these flower necklaces took nearly 500 flowers and didn’t last into the next day. ‘Ilima is also indigenous to Hawaii and other islands in the Pacific.
General Description
‘Ilima has a few different growth forms. It can grow as a small shrub from one to five feet tall. Near the seashore it grows fairly flat on the ground, spreading out along rocky substrate. Inland, in the dry forests, it grows more upright and sturdy. The flowers are ½ to 1 inch wide, yellow orange and parted. Like others in the Malvaceae family, the male stamen are arranged around a tube in the middle of the flower. Leaves are light green, with serrated edges (margins). Some leaves have tiny, soft hairs but others do not. It is found from sea level up to about 6,000 feet.
Habitat
The beautiful ‘illima flowers are particularly common on the drier sides of the islands and along the seashore. Unlike many of Hawaii’s native flora, ‘ilima grows well in somewhat disturbed areas.
Medicinal Uses
The flowers of ‘ilima were used as a source of medicine by native Hawaiians to cure general debility, womb disorders, and asthma. Juices from the flower were squeezed out to make a gentle baby laxative called kamakamaika’i.
The ʻIeʻie (Freycinetia arborea) is a densely branched, brittle, woody climber in the screwpalm family, Pandanaceae, that is endemic to thePacific Islands. ʻIeʻie is found in moist forest on the Hawaiian, Marquesas, Austral, Society, and Cook Islands. It grows into the forest canopy, attaching itself to a host tree using aerial roots. It may also grow as a sprawling tangle on the forest floor. The shiny green leaves have pointed ends and are spiny on the lower side of the midrib and along the edges.
Leaves measure 40–80 centimetres (16–31 in) long and 1–3 centimetres (0.39–1.2 in) wide, and are spirally arranged around the ends of branches.Flowers form on spike-like inflorescences at the end of branches, and are either staminate or pistillate. Staminate spikes are yellowish-white and up to 10 centimetres (3.9 in) in length. Pistillate spikes are 3–4 centimetres (1.2–1.6 in) but elongate to 7.5–9.5 centimetres (3.0–3.7 in) once fruit are produced. Three to four spikes are surrounded by orange-salmon bracts. The fruit is one centimeter (0.39 in) long and contains many 1.5-millimetre (0.059 in) seeds. The bracts and fruit of the ʻieʻie were a favorite food of the ʻōʻū (Psittirostra psittacea), an extinct Hawaiian honeycreeper that was formerly a principal seed dispersal vector for plants with small seeded, fleshy fruits in low elevation forests. It is also a favored food of the ʻalalā (Corvus hawaiiensis), which is currently extinct in the wild.
This showy, yellow-flowered plant is most often found in damp or wet soils in hills and mountains. It can withstand drought and trampling. It is not a very palatable food for livestock or other animals.
Description
This plant attains a height of one to four feet, terminating in a long raceme of golden-yellow flowers, each flower being 1/2 to 3/4 inch long. These plants usually occur in patches, since they spread via undergound stems. The leaves are compound and trifoliate with leaflets mainly oval and one to three inches long. At the base of each leaf are found two large leaflike stipules.
People often confuse this Golden Pea or False Lupine with true lupines in the genus Lupinus. However, it can easily be distinguished since there are three leaflets instead of five or more. False Lupine also has all stamens distinct, instead of united together as in true lupines.
