University of Maryland Extension: Plant of the Week
Catttail
Typha
Photo and text by Ellen Nibali
Cattails are as American as apple pie and edible, too.
Fond childhood memories include lighting them to make smoky punks, but cattails have been used for everything from baskets to boats by Native Americans and peoples around the globe.
The narrow leaves arise from reedy clumps. In late summer, beige flower spikes usually go unnoticed, but by early fall they become the velvety brown seedheads we know so well.
Birds nest in the stalks and eat the seed. Wildlife feed on the fleshy rhizomes.
Common cattails, Typha latifolia, are useful in sunny unmowable ditches or wet areas but too big and aggressive for small ponds.
Ornamental ponds can enjoy Typha augustifolia, narrow-leaf cattail, which reaches 4 feet, or Typha minima, Dwarf cattail which reaches only 12 to 18 inches.
Comments
Cattails are worldwide, not just North American. The Cattails in Africa's Lake Chad are the driving force in the expansion of the Sahara. Their harvest and control would solve a large number of problems, from food shortages to malaria.The one hitch is that the plant collects toxic chemicals. It is very useful that way, but its use as food requires serious inspection. What isn't fit for eating is fit for biofuel feedstock.
Posted by: Stephen Klaber | October 22, 2010 7:55 AM