long slender green pods

long slender green pods

full of flat seeds with two wings

to waft on the wind

This young catawba has a peculiar penchant for producing little corkscrew pods that sometimes curl around their long straight neighbors. In early summer, the prolific catawba blossoms clustered on their long stems have fallen, replaced by foot-long green seedpods dangling from the branches, each pod containing numerous seeds. As the pods mature they gradually turn purple and then brown. My sister and I used to pass a big catawba tree on the way to school and we would pretend to smoke the "lady cigars." We didn't know that it was a no-no to put them in our mouth, because they contain a mild narcotic and sedative. Perhaps that's what got us through boring school days! When the brown pods split open the seeds slip out. The seeds are long and thin and brown, with a delicate fringed wing on each end. If the seeds simply fell to the ground beneath the tree, they would have little chance of growing in the dense shade of the enormous leaves, so each seed comes equipped with wings to aid in wind dispersal. The seeds will sprout in almost any soil. Because of tree grows quickly and the wood is resistance to rot, it was long favored for fence posts and railroad ties. But don't try to eat the roots, they're poisonous!