drawn by sweet honey

drawn by sweet honey
scent, honey bees gather nectar
from rattlesnake master

Honey bees, drawn by a strong honey-like scent, are swarming over the prickly pom pom blossom heads of rattlesnake master. Other insects also seek the sweet nectar: black wasps, black horse flies, butterflies, moths, skippers, bugs and beetles.

The whole plant is prickly. Spiky white bracts stick out all over the spherical multi-flower heads that develop in clusters at the top of long stems, and the long sword-shaped leaves are edged with small teeth. The scientific name, Eryngium yuccifolium, pretty much sums up the primary characteristics of this native forb. Eryngium is Greek for "prickly plant" and yuccifolium means "yucca leaves." All those prickles are a good defense against mammalian herbivores, though they may nip the ends of the leaves. The caterpillar of the rare rattlesnake master borer moth will bore into the stem and feed off of the pith.

Rattlesnake master is an odd member of the carrot family that resembles a yucca, a member of the lily family, with globular flower heads that look more like a thistle, a member of the composite family. But it is a true native prairie plant, which propagates by offsets developing at the base of each plant. 

Indigenous tribes used the dried seed heads as rattles. Perhaps because the seed heads rattled like a rattlesnake, pioneers erroneously believed the root of the plant, also known as button snake-root, was an antidote for rattlesnake bite.

sweet scent of wild plum

sweet scent of wild plum -- 

honey bees hover over 

froth of white blossoms

With frost continuing into May, the wild plums blossomed late this year. The first fruit trees to bloom, their sweet scent quickly attracted our neighbor's honey bees, as well as other pollinators such as native green bees, wasps and even horse flies. I, too, am drawn by the alluring fragrance and stand for a long time with my nose close to the small, frilly white flowers, attuning my breath to the hum of the bees.

horse flies sucking nectar

horse flies sucking nectar 

from the prickly white balls

of Rattlesnake Master

Few flowers dare to bloom in this prolonged high heat and drought, but Rattlesnake Master is one of them. This odd member of the Carrot family looks more like some kind of desert plant with its long, strappy leaves and prickly balls of flowers. But it is actually a tallgrass prairie species with a deep root that helps protect it from drought, as well as an unusual flower arrangement adapted to heat and dry conditions. At the top of a long stalk, the plant divides into short stems ending in whitish green balls consisting of many small white flowers surrounded by prickly bracts. The flowers bloom in mid- to late summer and emit a strong honey-like scent in bright sunlight. Native Americans used the dry seedheads as rattles. Pioneers may have associated the rattle with rattlesnakes because they believed, erroneously, that the root could be used as an antidote for rattlesnake bite.
          Pollinators are equally hard-pressed to find nectar-bearing flowers, so it's not surprising that some of them are attracted to Rattlesnake Master. When I stop to watch some large, black insects crawling all over the white flower balls of a small patch of Rattlesnake Master, I am surprised that these pollinators are not Dark bees. Their fat black bristle-bottom bodies are unlike a bee's elongated body, and their broad face and large horizontal eyes do not look anything like a bee's heart-shaped face and angular eyes. With a start I recognize them -- Horse flies -- and I take a few steps back. From my past experience with Horse flies, they will bite painfully, usually on the back of the neck, and will suck blood. However, these Horse flies seem oblivious to my bare neck and arms, so I conclude that they are not the vampire females but rather the nectar- and pollen-feeding males. I step up for a few closeup photos and the docile males just continue busily sucking nectar.