May Flowers: May Apple

May Apple (photo by Dianne Machesney)

The green umbrellas you see in the woods right now are May Apples.  They only produce a flower on the plants with a double umbrella.  The flowers sprout at the “Y” where the umbrellas join and hide beneath them, bowing their heads toward the ground.

The flowers appear in May, then the seed pods form in their place looking like a green “apple.”  Hence the May Apple name.

Take a peek under the umbrellas and you’ll see them blooming now in western Pennsylvania. 

(photo by Dianne Machesney)

2 thoughts on “May Flowers: May Apple

  1. Those are incredible..but more incredible is the little one at the Cathedral who found its wings! What a sight that has been the last 5 minutes.

  2. We get tons of these in the woods adjacent to my house. It’s so neat to see a grouping of them. I remember thinking as a child that they looked like gigantic shamrocks. 🙂 I was struggling to remember what they are called, so thank you very much for posting this article!

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