A toxic native wildflower is blooming everywhere this week
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Native Plants
If you walk wooded trails or pastures this time of year, those clusters of fuzzy white fall flowers you're seeing are likely white snakeroot, a plant worth learning to identify since it's poisonous to grazing animals and was once a hidden killer through tainted milk.
White snakeroot is a shade-loving wildflower that explodes into clouds of tiny white blooms every autumn, and right now it's one of the most-logged plants on the nature-tracking app iNaturalist. It's easy to notice because it carpets forest edges and shady yards just as everything else is dying back, but it's also toxic: grazing animals that eat it can get sick, and in the 1800s it caused deadly 'milk sickness' in people who drank milk from cows that had grazed on it.
Key Findings
1,283 observations of white snakeroot were logged in the US in the past 7 days, among the highest counts for any plant species on iNaturalist this week
This is a 29% drop from the prior week's count of 1,800 observations
The species belongs to the aster family (Asteraceae) and is known for historical toxicity, including causing 'milk sickness' in humans via contaminated dairy
chevron_right Technical Summary
White snakeroot sightings are spiking across the US right now, with nearly 1,300 observations logged on iNaturalist in the past week alone. This fall bloomer is easy to spot but also toxic to livestock and historically linked to human poisoning through contaminated milk.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Trending: white snakeroot (Ageratina altissima) — 1283 observations this week
White snakeroot (Ageratina altissima) is a species in the family Asteraceae. iNaturalist users recorded 1283 observations of it in the United States in the 7 days before today, among the most for a...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
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Photo by Ira Gershenhorn, taken in New York, United States. CC0 via iNaturalist.
Phenology is the study of recurring biological events in plant life cycles—such as flowering, fruiting, and germination—and how these events are timed in response to seasonal and climatic conditions. This research is essential to plant science because phenological patterns directly influence
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