Shooting Star

Twinkle, twinkle, Shooting Star
We don't wonder what you are.
On the Earth, your bright clad form
Captures every heart by storm.

       One of the brightest robed of our Spring flowers is the Shooting Star. I am sure you all love it because everyone I know, whether boy or girl, man or woman, loves it. On its side, it seems to love California for it grows from the South to the North and from the Pacific to the heights of the Sierras. Sometimes it is small; sometimes large; sometimes pale; sometimes ruddy; but always it is lovely.

       The whole plant works to make the beautiful flower. You know the clump of thick green leaves that cling close to the ground. They come out so early in the Spring that Shooting Star has to prepare them against the biting nips of Jack Frost. She makes them hug Mother Earth and also cling close together. She makes them thick all through. She does not cut them into parts as Buttercup does her leaves. All this so that they will be warm in the cold Spring winds and can help raise a lovely blossom head. Their upper side is shining to catch the eye of passing insects, but their lower side is covered over for warmth.

       Up from the center of this clump of leaves arises a strong thick round stem with no branches. When it reaches the point where the flower stalks will start; it swells out all around. From this swelled point, many little stalks climb up higher. Each bears a flower bud.

       You see the five petals are joined together in front into a short tube and then are flung back in graceful banners. The tube is colored a dark maroon, with bands of yellow and white to enliven it. The banners are rose-pink like the soft clouds in the eastern sky at dawn.

       The stamens are made to add to the beauty as well as to do their life work. Their stems are short and fixed inside the corolla tube; but the anthers are long and form a ring outside the tube's top. They are colored a dark violet, and they shine like velvet against the yellow and white circles on the petals. Through this anther ring, the pistil extends like a beak.

       While the petals bloom, the five sepals curve backward to give them all the room. When the seeds are growing and the petals fading, the calyx straightens itself up around the seedcase.

       All the Shooting Stars at the top of the stem do not bloom out at once. Indeed, several weeks pass from when the first beautiful corolla flings its banners wide until the last one drops off its ripening seedcase. Shooting Star has a very good reason for this. It is the same reason she has for grouping her flowers together at the top of her stem.

       She raises her stem above her leaves so as to be easily seen. She sends out a group of flowers together so as to make a greater mass of color. She has the flowers bloom at different times so that the color will be waving longer. All her plans are made to attract the insects eyes. She must interest them through their eyes. She has not much honey to offer them and little fragrance to attract them. She can give them plenty of rich pollen if they like that. But the first thing to do is to attract them to the pollen.

       The insects do see the bright corolla. They do come buzzing along. They are not so excited as when they received the Wall Flower's invitation, but still they do come. When they push their heads into the anther ring, they get the pollen all over them. Then, when they visit the next Shooting Star, the long bill of the pistil touches their head and takes off the pollen.

       Shooting Star is careful of her pollen. Her anthers hold it fast until something shakes them. If no insect comes before the flower grows old, then the pistil beak turns the stigma up, and the anthers let the pollen fall upon it and the ovules receive it.

       Have you noticed the little stalks that hold the flowers? When they hold a bud, they stand up straight to let it get the sunshine. When the corolla opens, they curve downward so as to protect the pollen from the wind. When the seed is formed, they straighten up again, holding the seedcase to the sun. Do you know how this seedcase opens and lets out the seeds. 

       Did you ever dig up a Shooting Star and look at its root? If you plant one in your garden, you may have a new Shooting Star there next year. Try the seeds too. Take a ripe seedcase and scatter the seeds without touching them. Scatter them in some warm spot where the wind will not come. They know how to get underground themselves. Perhaps they will grow. Perhaps they will not. Nothing is lost by trying.

       In Southern Europe, the pigs are fond of the root of Shooting Star. They dig it up and gobble it down greedily. So, in those countries, the common name of this lovely flower is  'Sow-Bread. '' Not a pretty name, is it? What do you call the flower? Some children call it "Mosquito Bill" and some 'Roosters." Both these names come from the shape of the pistil. I have heard that some call it "Mad Violet,"though why I do not understand. It does not look like a violet nor does it seem at all angry. It never acts wildly, but just grows quietly, crouched near the ground.

       I like best the commonest name, "Shooting Star." That gives the thought that the flowers' loveliness is not all of the earth. They have some of the calm beautiful spirit of the Stars. 

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