Cattail

It would be hard to find a wetland plant as iconic as the cattail, with its brown, "hot-dog-on-a-stick" flower spikes. Cattails offer more than a scenic backdrop; they create an important wildlife habitat, providing food for small mammals and cover for water birds. Redwing blackbirds, ducks, and geese make nests in dense stands of cattails. These plants help prevent erosion, and they are important in keeping waterways clean and healthy, by filtering out nutrients and contaminants.

Deep green, long, narrow, strap-like leaves emerge from the base of the stem and grow upward, but these grass-like plants get their name from their tall, brown flower spikes. Take a close look, and you'll see that a flower spike actually bears separate male and female flowers. The conspicuous brown part is made up of female flowers, and it is topped by a thinner, yellow spire of male flowers. Male flowers bloom first, producing pollen that will fertilize female flowers. In the fall, female flowers explode into white, fuzzy seed-heads.

You may have seen fresh or dried flower arrangements adorned with dried cattails. If you want to try this yourself, be sure to paint the spikes with varnish or clear spray, or you'll eventually be cleaning up a "snow storm" of fluff when the seeds dry! Long cattail leaves can be used to weave mats and chair bottoms, and the starchy rhizomes can be eaten or used to make a flour.