We tend to think of skunk cabbage as the miracle plant that melts the ice in late winter in order to bloom, and a sure sign of spring. (Next season's tightly rolled leaves, however, have been poking up since fall.)
Skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus) gets its common name—and the specific epithet of its botanic name, foetidus—from the smell of the leaves when crushed. I actually like the astringent, pungent smell and don't mind walking though a patch of the lush plants. It is a shade-tolerant perennial, so it grows in wooded wetlands and along streams. According to Charles B. Reddington in Plants in Wetlands (Kendall/Hunt 1994, pp. 264-66) the metabolism of the flower inflorescence increases the plant temperature above the ambient air, melting the snow around it and making it the earliest source of pollen for bees. It is also pollinated by carrion flies and its deep roots are critical to prevent erosion in swamps that are subject to the moving water of flooding.
