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Wildflower Articles for Kids - Wildflower Articles for Children
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A Quick History of Wildflowers
By Ryan Gilbert
Just thinking of wildflowers is enough to make most people smile, the vision
of a crocus or a snowdrop struggling through the snow fighting to herald spring. Wildflowers herald new growth and new life, the end
of the depths of winter the magnificence of color. Wildflowers are versatile enough to grow virtually anywhere on mountain sides,
the edelweiss flourishes, in meadows the buttercup blossoms, they grow on the side or country lanes or in the middle of a metropolis.
They bud in desert conditions on vast open plains and next to beaches. They have a vibrant energy in their magnificent colors which
are like the plumage on rare birds. Children can be seen clutching bluebells to their chests to present to their mothers', artists
paint them in all their hues, and everyone feels better after just a single glimpse of life, after the cold desolation of most winters.
Wildflowers
came from nowhere they merely appeared but it is only recently in the last hundred years that they have been grown commercially. Nineteenth
Century botanists, such a Wilhelm Hofmeister cataloged them and many people pressed them between the leaves of books to preserve them.
This interest in wild flowers fostered by Darwin's botanists on his trips to the Galapagos Islands led many wealthy aristocrats and
industrialists to grow them. Seed collections grew from these humble beginnings and today there are over twenty thousand species in
America alone.
Thanks to the knowledge of American Indians over 2,000 plants are used for their medical properties which accounts
for a staggering ten percent of all the wildflowers'. Originally this knowledge was exploited by herbalist and homeopathic doctors,
but today the pharmaceutical companies have realized how incredibly powerful and cheap this knowledge is.
This is just one of
the reasons why biodiversity is incredibly important. The more plants we have the more there properties can be researched because
what we already know is only the tip of the iceberg. Once a species is lost it is lost forever and all its potential healing properties
are gone. Today foxglove provides us with Digitalis one of the most effective treatments for some types of heart disease at a fraction
of the cost of other more expensive treatments.
American Indians used turtlehead for skin complaints and trout lilies were steamed
to cure hiccoughs whilst Marsh Marigold was a cough syrup with no side effects. Wildflowers also release oxygen into our atmosphere
which benefits all life on earth. Plants and wildflowers are a vital part of our ecosystem for keeping us healthy and nourished and
preventing disease.
Many wildflower names are eponymous, whilst others are prosaic. It does not take much imagination or a leap of faith to work out that
sandpaper plant is very rough and resembles the texture of sandpaper, whilst the Cheese bush smells like cheese. Sometimes the history
of a plant is not clear for instance the hardy hibiscus hybrid is not a relative of the delicate Mediterranean hibiscus, it was bred
in America and can grow up to a zone 4.
Wildflowers have always appeared in the works of artists, Monet, Renoir and Van Gogh
immortalized their beauty in oils. Others captured their grace and charm in watercolors. In America Mary Walcott painted American
Wildflowers and there are over 400 in the Smithsonian museum. Not only are they beautifully portrayed but they are also accurate and
come complete with a brief description.
Many American artists contrast the ephemeral beauty of wildflowers with stark natural
backdrops of Nevada deserts, or majestic Alaskan mountains. A contemporary artist Judith Buswell has an original use she transforms
her greetings cards with designs of wildflowers. These evocative images are so powerful that they can be found on the cover of journals
notebooks and personal checks.
The classic novel and film Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte uses the image of the Scottish wildflower
Heather which is also a girl's name as is Lily, Rose, Daisy and Violet. Legends have grown up around flowers and many of them have
a charm so many years later. The Forget me Not is a striking blue flower and the sight of it inspired a German knight to pluck it
for his lady love, in doing so he was swept away by a stream never to be seen again, but shouted forget me not! Black eyed Susan and
her lover Sweet William complement each other perfectly and bloom at the same time.
Wildflowers have been so inspiring and are
regarded as so important that a Wildflower ark has been established in the UK in Middleborough an industrial area in the North East. Its
object is to preserve the seeds in the event of a man made tragedy or catastrophe.
Ryan Gilbert is a successful freelance
writer. He occasionally reviews websites that offer the best deals, promotions and discounts on bank checking related products. You
can learn more about and order personal checks at cheap personal checks
