Trailing Arbutus

 I was reminded yesterday that this little flower is out.....  Arbutus has such a lovely scent which only intensifies with age. It is easy to miss, because these little flowers (less than half an inch) grow low to the ground barely sticking their heads above the leaf litter. It is the state flower of Massachusetts and is protected by law. Some may be surprised that this is our state flower.... I think the confusion lies in the fact that it goes by more than one name. May Flower being one. In Massachusetts there is another flower that is also called May Flower, though its full name is Canada May Flower. The later flower is much more plentiful, growing everywhere, and it is easy to see how a resident of this state could assume that when the state flower is mentioned, the Canada May Flower is what comes to mind. Trailing Arbutus has been called May Flower for a very long time.... John Greenleaf Whittier even wrote about them in a poem. Folklore has it that it was the first flower the Pilgrims saw after their very difficult first winter in New England.  It was at that time, referred to as a May Flower. Maybe... named after the ship that brought them safely through their long hard journey to the new world, not unlike the long hard journey through their first winter..... or so the story goes.


Where I found it: road side