Woodland Gardening
American pokeweed, (Phytolacca americana), is a herbaceous perennial plant. It belongs to the pokeweed family Phytolaccaceae growing up to 8 feet (2 meters, 4 feet in my woodland garden), in height. It is native to eastern North America, the Midwest, the Gulf Coast, and the West coast states of the USA. Many people consider it a weed. I remove all the new seedlings I find, but 2-3 grow in a far corner of my yard, behind a lattice privacy barrier. Birds eat the berries but they are toxic to mammals.
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| American pokeweed berries (Phytolacca americana) |
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| American pokeweed flowers (Phytolacca americana) |
Polk Salad Annie” is a 1968 song written and performed by Tony Joe White. Its lyrics describe the lifestyle of a poor rural Southern girl and her family. Traditionally, the term to describe the type of food highlighted in the song is polk or poke sallet, a cooked greens dish made from pokeweed. Its 1969 single release peaked at No. 8 on the Billboard Hot 100. In Canada, the song made No. 10 on the RPM Magazine Hot Singles chart. Elvis Presley's version also made the song popular.
American pokeweed are members of the Caryophyllales Order. Caryophyllales is an order of flowering plants that includes the cacti, carnations, amaranths, ice plants, beets, and many carnivorous plants. Many members are succulent, having fleshy stems or leaves.
References.
- Bethard, Wayne. Lotions, Potions, and Deadly Elixirs: Frontier Medicine in the American West. Lanham, Md: Roberts Rinehart Publishers, 2013.
- Loughmiller, Campbell, Lynn Loughmiller, and Damon E. Waitt. Texas Wildflowers: A Field Guide. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2006. Print.
- Phytolacca Americana (cultivated). , Wilson, Hugh, 2011. Internet resource
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