One of my favorite things about enjoying a marsh is floating above it in a boat searching the water below for the universe that has been covered by the tide. It is as if you are flying high over a rainforest and far below is a dense world that you want to enter. On the surface tension are spiders and beetles running from one blade of protruding grass to another and occasionally a smelt or crab will scurry further below. It is very dynamic and happily keeps me mesmerized. For the most part, the plants are stationary and the animals are the ones that move with the tidal influence. There is one plant though, that, no matter how many times I see it, enthralls me. This fun plant, while attached with its roots in the ground, sends stolons with succulent green leaves, that are, in essence, little balloons lifting the unattached parts of the plant above the soil when the water encompasses all. What you’ll see when the tide is in is a floating, branching yellow-green bubbly mat with an anchor line stuck in the mud below.
Batis maritima, also known as –ready— Turtleweed, Saltwort and Beachwort (great names!), is a succulent mid-marsh denizen that creeps around the marsh dropping its roots where it is able. Truly remarkable, this plant snakes in and out of dominant patches of other plants and is found throughout the marsh to some degree. Although it enjoys the mid-marsh, it will search out both the high and low for an appealing place of residence. In the marsh plain, where all sorts of heterogeneous topographies are found, the best contrast of the biotic and abiotic is when Batis encircles a salt-panne creating a border around the barren mud. When it aggregates around something, it looks as if the soil below it is bubbling over in a snotty viscous cancer: green warts multiplying and calcifying together.
It is native to southern coastal areas of North America and into Central and South America. It is the only species in its family (Bataceae) around here. It is an invasive weed in Hawaii actually and apparently there are major eradication programs to take it out. I have no idea what pollinates this plant. Its sexual parts are incredibly tiny and I can only imagine one of the many ity-bity wetland pollinators loving it. I have no idea what eats it; it tastes salty (as all salt-marsh plants do) and I can imagine some salt-marsh shrew chewing through its juicy leaves.
Batis is actually, if I can say this, my favorite plant. I really don’t know why. There are other plants with gorgeous flowers (The Hibiscus wins this one for me- every time I see one I think of Aime Cesaire: “The hibiscus is but an exploded eye.”), with more interesting characteristics and behaviors (The Drosera or Sundew is a prime example as it is a carnivorous plant that lives in bogs –not needing to derive sustenance from its roots, certain species will actually move throughout a wetland if a current propels them so) and more dominating personalities (I am thinking of any large tree but specifically the Giant Redwoods in Northern California). There are so many plants that I am thinking of right now that are incredibly unique but there is something about Batis. It is strong in its resilience, unassuming with its size, uncompromising in its presence. Its flowers are nothing more than pencil-tip-sized pistils and stamens sticking out of a green bulb no larger than the tip of your pinky—no colorful petals, no inviting smells. Its fruit is that same pinky-sized bulb transformed into an incongruous dense pebble.
Maybe I like it because it was the first plant I recognized in the marsh and it is nostalgia, I don’t honestly remember. Maybe I like it because one of its common names is Turtleweed. I know every time I see it though, floating or not, I am captivated.
Batis maritima, also known as –ready— Turtleweed, Saltwort and Beachwort (great names!), is a succulent mid-marsh denizen that creeps around the marsh dropping its roots where it is able. Truly remarkable, this plant snakes in and out of dominant patches of other plants and is found throughout the marsh to some degree. Although it enjoys the mid-marsh, it will search out both the high and low for an appealing place of residence. In the marsh plain, where all sorts of heterogeneous topographies are found, the best contrast of the biotic and abiotic is when Batis encircles a salt-panne creating a border around the barren mud. When it aggregates around something, it looks as if the soil below it is bubbling over in a snotty viscous cancer: green warts multiplying and calcifying together.
It is native to southern coastal areas of North America and into Central and South America. It is the only species in its family (Bataceae) around here. It is an invasive weed in Hawaii actually and apparently there are major eradication programs to take it out. I have no idea what pollinates this plant. Its sexual parts are incredibly tiny and I can only imagine one of the many ity-bity wetland pollinators loving it. I have no idea what eats it; it tastes salty (as all salt-marsh plants do) and I can imagine some salt-marsh shrew chewing through its juicy leaves.
Batis is actually, if I can say this, my favorite plant. I really don’t know why. There are other plants with gorgeous flowers (The Hibiscus wins this one for me- every time I see one I think of Aime Cesaire: “The hibiscus is but an exploded eye.”), with more interesting characteristics and behaviors (The Drosera or Sundew is a prime example as it is a carnivorous plant that lives in bogs –not needing to derive sustenance from its roots, certain species will actually move throughout a wetland if a current propels them so) and more dominating personalities (I am thinking of any large tree but specifically the Giant Redwoods in Northern California). There are so many plants that I am thinking of right now that are incredibly unique but there is something about Batis. It is strong in its resilience, unassuming with its size, uncompromising in its presence. Its flowers are nothing more than pencil-tip-sized pistils and stamens sticking out of a green bulb no larger than the tip of your pinky—no colorful petals, no inviting smells. Its fruit is that same pinky-sized bulb transformed into an incongruous dense pebble.
Maybe I like it because it was the first plant I recognized in the marsh and it is nostalgia, I don’t honestly remember. Maybe I like it because one of its common names is Turtleweed. I know every time I see it though, floating or not, I am captivated.
Enjoy,
Taylor
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