Johnny-Jump-Up: Lesson 1

Johnny-Jump-Up is always cheerful!

Little smiling golden faces‚
"How do you do? How do you do?"
Brightening shade or wind-swept places‚
"Much, much better for seeing you."

       If there is one of our wild flowers that is loved more than another by the boys, I am sure it is Johnny-Jump-Up. Girls love it, too, but some of them have other favorites. Every boy I have ever known, whether his age was seven years or seventy, seems to have a tender spot in his heart for this golden beauty.
       Johnny-Jump-Up seems to return this affection. It reaches up above its leaves and smiles sunnily right into our eyes. Then we smile back. That is the way, you know, that smiles travel around the World. Each person who smiles wins other smiles.
       The corolla, you see, is like pure gold, very much like the real gold that the miners dig out of our Sierras. Perhaps it takes a great deal of work to make this color, for on the back of the two up-standing petals, Johnny does not use it. It uses instead a rich brown, a color that looks well with the gold around it. The honey paths on the lower petals are a dark purple. Johnny must take much care in getting these colors, for each is very beautiful in itself. Don't you think they look beautiful together?
       Johnny-Jump-Up groups the five petals in a way different from that used by Baby-Blue-Eyes or the other flowers we have studied. You have seen the same shape in the pansies in your home garden. Johnny-Jump-Up is a country cousin of your garden pansies and is called ''Yellow Pansy'' by some people.
       Two petals, you see, are standing up, two are stretching out to the sides, and one, deeply marked, spreads out across the bottom.
       If you pull out one of the side petals, you will find that the honey paths are only on one half of it. On the other half, a little above where it joins the rest of the flower, is a brush of fine yellow hairs.
       Then look again at a whole blossom. You see that the two little brushes on the two side petals form an arch over the pistil and stamens. No dampness can get in under these little brushes to harm the important seed-making parts.
       Look at the lower petal of all. See how it curves up just in front of the center, making a little platform. Then, it narrows down behind and makes a little hood. If you pull off this petal, you will find that the hood holds just what Mrs. Bug is seeking.
       Inside the petals are five stamens. The anthers stand in a ring, around the pistil. Part of this anther ring shows as you look a whole flower in the face. It is the little red spot above the lowest petal.
       Below it, you see a green sticky knob. That is the stigma, the top of the pistil. If you look at the whole pistil, you see it is shaped just like a club. It grows up through the ring of stamens and lays its round green top on that platform of the lowest petal.
       Mrs. Bug comes prowling around to find her way into that well of honey. She gets a good footing on the brushes on the side petals. Then she unwinds her long tongue and pushes it under the club of the pistil back into the honey. While she is wiping her tongue to get off every drop of that delicious honey, the anthers open and drop their pollen upon it. When she gets to the next Johnny-Jump-Up, her pollen-covered tongue hits the stigma laying on the platform. The little stigma very kindly dusts the tongue off clean. Then, Mrs. Bug can enjoy the honey better, and Johnny-Jump-Up's little waiting ovules receive good pollen to make new seed.
       The calyx does not fall off when the corolla fades. It holds its five sepals around the growing seedcase. The sepals are not all the same size, but each generally has a little ear-like lobe at its base. What do you suppose that is for?
       Johnny-Jump-Up gets this name from the way it springs up above its leaves. You see that each flower has a long stem just to itself. It does not share its stalk as does Buttercup or White-Forget-Me-Not. When you picked a Johnny-Jump-Up, did the stem break off clean like a Poppy stem does? Did you examine it? If not, then look at it now. See the inner cord that seems to be quite separate from the outer covering. Twine this inner cord around, and you will see that it is made up of a number of fibers tied together. That is what makes the stem so strong.
       There is a story "United We Are Strong." The Father in the story knew it is harder to break a bundle of sticks than it is to break one single stick. Johnny-Jump-Up, too, knows this kind of wisdom. She knows that if her stem was made of a single material, it would easily be snapped off by wind or animal. So, she weaves a number of fibers together and makes a strong body to hold up her sunny face.
       The leaves of Johnny-Jump-Up are carried on the same kind of stems as the flowers. Each leaf, too, has a stem of its own, a stem much longer than the leaf itself is. Do most leaves have stems longer than themselves? Look around your plant friends and find out.
       The leaves of Johnny-Jump-Up are pretty to draw. You see they are somewhat heart shaped, and yet you can draw four lines around them. Be sure to make the edge scalloped and put in the big veins running from the outside all to the same point where the leaf sets on the stem.

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