June 26, 2011 - Wet Feet
Welcome to the Nature Notebook.

Cattails like wet feet. They commonly grow along pond and lake shores, in wetlands and roadside ditches. Cattail flower heads are just developing. Flanked by long, narrow green leaves, they appear as green sausage-shaped structures on long stalks. These are actually densely packed female flowers. At the top of this hot dog on a stick is a small spike of male flowers. Cattails depend on the wind for pollination. Once that occurs, the male flowers wither away and the green flower head turns into the brown, seed-bearing cattail head that is so familiar. Tap a green cattail head and you will see a cloud of fine yellow pollen drift out. Native Americans used to gather this pollen and mix it with flour to make rich, nutritious cakes. That pollen will soon be gone as the green flower heads turn brown.

This is PPL's naturalist, Jon Beam, with the Nature Notebook for WVIA.