Fragments From Floyd

You know you’re in the country when you find pictures of over-sized vegetables on the front page of the weekly paper.

So here’s my entry: the world’s (or at least our subdivision of Greater Goose Creek’s) largest mullein plant. It grows now in the middle of what has been for the past several years (and prior to the Fortress Stockade) the Deer Salad Park (a.k.a. our garden) where there must still be some residual nutrients remaining. This specimen stands 7 feet tall and is just now starting to put out flowers on its central stalk, an erect sessile spike inflorescence that has earned it a new name.

Older common names include “rabbit tobacco”, and in our family because of its soft leaves it goes by either “baby bunny ears” or “mountain toilet paper.” However, from some recent DC-area visitor-friends out here, we learned that in some circles this plant in its full tumescence is known as the “penis plant”. (Now watch my google hits take a shift for the worse!)

And who can tell me where the image caption comes from? Anyone? Anyone?

Stumble it!