STORY BEHIND THE ART OF JOAN KEESEY

Weird, Wild, & Wonderful

Second New York Botanical Garden Triennial Exhibition

2014 - 2016

Snow Plant with Bracken Fern

Sarcodes sanguinea

The Snow Plant (Sarcodes sanguinea) is truly “Weird, Wild and Wonderful”. Its mechanism for obtaining nutrients is “Weird”; as a native to Western North America it is “Wild”, and its appearance is both “Weird and Wonderful”. When I heard about WW&W, I thought, “this is the plant for this show”. It is a good example of the amazing variety of plant forms and colors, and of mechanisms by which a plant can survive.

My husband and I have a cabin in the Southern Sierra Nevada in California where I have developed an interest in California native plants and botanical illustration. The Snow Plant is one of the first plants to appear in the Sierra Nevada in early spring just after the snow has melted. Because the landscape is still wintery and bleak and the Snow Plant grows in the dense litter of dead leaves and needles of the conifer forest, it is a real treat to come across a single plant or a group of plants. It is occasionally accompanied by the early shoots of Bracken Fern (Pteridium aquilinum) or conifer saplings. The Snow Plant’s brilliant red color is quite shocking and unexpected - its botanical name, Sarcodes sanguinea, means bloody flesh! A really good fresh plant can look almost manufactured, like a toy made out of bright red, red-orange, or rose-colored plastic. 

Found from Oregon through the mountains of California into Baja California, the Snow Plant is a mycotrophic (fungus eating) plant. It is unable to photosynthesize and is a parasitic plant that derives sustenance from mycorrhizal fungi that attach to the roots of trees. The Snow Plant does not, however, kill the fungi. They have a symbiotic relationship; the Snow Plant provides fixed carbon to the fungus, and in return the fungus provides mineral nutrients, water, and protection from pathogens. The Snow Plant takes advantage of this mutualism by tapping into the network and stealing sugars from the tree, the photosynthetic partner, by way of the fungus. 

The Snow Plant is a member of the Heath Family (Ericaceae), a family that includes a great variety of plants in the Sierra Nevada: Manzanita, Western Blueberry, White-veined Wintergreen, White and Purple Heather, Labrador Tea, Western Azalea along with several other mycotrophic plants such as Pinedrops and Sugar Stick. Many of these plants have a bell shaped flower and produce a berry, but otherwise bear little resemblance to each other and grow in very different habitats, from foothill chaparral to alpine meadows.

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Read more about this artist's work: 16th Annual International