Common Cattail

Family: Typhaceae (Cattail family)
Genus: Typha
Species:latifolia

This month’s featured plant isn’t one you’re likely to find in your typical home garden. Big, brawny cattails aren’t domesticated—they’re more suited to expansive wetlands than they are to mixed borders. We see them by the side of the road as we pass by, and most of us hardly give them a thought. They are a part of our natural landscape, these plants that some call weeds and others call “aquatic herbs.” No less an authority than the Washington State Department of Ecology refers to cattail as “one of the most common and easily identified of our [Washington State native] water-loving plants.” Go to http://www.ecy.wa.gov/ecyhome.html and you’ll find a wealth of information about the value of Typha latifolia in keeping lakes healthy by filtering runoff and reducing shoreline erosion. Cattails also provide habitat for many types of wildlife and birds. And for centuries, they were a source of food, building material, and medicine for native peoples.

It was John Van Miert who drew my attention to cattails. Among his many talents is a particular penchant for observing what’s around him, learning about it, and passing that knowledge along to others. Not too long ago I was treated to a glimpse of a fall bouquet assembled by John and Rosamonde, arranged to celebrate the season and featuring interesting seed pods. They began with the dramatic pods of Siberian iris and added a dried thistle or two, but they needed something else to serve as a standard, an upright stem to preside over the rest. So John drove out to Hovander and stopped along the way to cut one cattail flower spike. That did the trick. In a few days, the spike began to release its seeds in a pouf of fluffy down, spilling out from the top, enveloping the brown spike in a halo of fluff. It was the very definition of “gossamer.” What a lovely sight!

John knew this would happen, because years ago he made an arrangement of several cattail flower heads, in the fall, and set it in his living room. A few days later, someone opened the door to the outside, a gust of fall wind blew in—and the seeds, the substance of the gossamer, all 117,000 to 268,000 of them per stalk—drifted airily into every single corner of his house and made themselves at home. It took months to find them all and evict them from the premises. So now, he chooses only one stalk; and as soon as the pouf causes Rosamonde to sneeze for the very first time, out it goes, banished to the compost. He doesn’t worry about the seeds catching hold and making nuisances of themselves in his yard, because the wet areas necessary for their survival are far, far away.

Cattails grow in Europe—they’re found in arctic, temperate, subtropical, and tropical regions, throughout Asia and Africa, Central America, New Zealand, Australia, and Japan—so John had encountered them before. But he really started to study them after he moved to the United States in 1960. An avid hiker and a good planner, he learned that they were a food source in the woods in cases of emergency. He read about them in what he calls his most valuable source of Northwest native plant information, Trees, Shrubs & Flowers to Know in Washington, by C.P. Lyons, a book published in 1956. Mr. Lyons had a television show in the 1960s, as well, and John “met” him weekly by watching his presentations. An interesting sidelight is that Rosamonde, before she met John, had the very same book. She used it as a field guide and, wonderful writer that she is, put notations about her plant sightings next to each entry. That copy of the book, with her charming observations, remains in their library today.

John returns to Mr. Lyons’s book often—it was updated in 1995 to Trees, Shrubs & Flowers to Know in British Columbia & Washington, and Bill Merilees joined C.P. Lyons as co-author. It remains one of the information sources he trusts the most, based on his own experience and years of accumulated knowledge. Another is The Color Dictionary of Flowers and Plants, authored by Roy Hay and Patrick M. Synge and published in 1969. John finds this latter work invaluable when identifying cultivated plants. Newer garden books, in John’s opinion, tend to offer less comprehensive and detailed information; and they are often not specific to our Pacific Northwest region. We have a particular set of horticultural blessings and challenges here, requiring specific consideration and treatment. That’s why it’s a pleasure for me to work with John on Garden Sense, a compilation of his Garden Miscellany columns from the Master Gardener newsletter, augmented with questions he and I encounter frequently from gardeners in the area. We’re working away on the book now, and we should have it ready for publication soon.

Alas, there will be little information about cattails in Garden Sense. But our book does emphasize the importance of observing one’s surroundings and seeking out trustworthy and accurate sources of reliable information. Those two factors go a long way towards determining success in one’s garden. John says so, and I always trust what John says. The only thing more remarkable than the depth and breadth of John’s garden knowledge is his unstinting willingness to share it with others.

**Please join John and me at the graduation celebration dinner on November 7, 2002. I’ll be sharing some of what I’ve learned from John in my presentation about garden trends, and he’ll be there to help me answer your questions.
~Cheryll Greenwood Kinsley