Water Horsetail, Equisetum fluviatile, Native Minnesota Wildflower plant, Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden

	Plants of the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden
	Common Name	Scientific Name	Plant Family	Garden Location	Prime Season
	Water Horsetail	Equisetum fluviatile L.	Horsetail (Equisetaceae)	Woodland - Bog	Late Spring to Early Summer
Other names and notes	(River Horsetail). Horsetails are allies of ferns. The Water Horsetail is quite common in swamps and wet areas. They lack flowers and true leaves. The thick stem is dark green, 80% hollow, jointed, with 15 to 20 dark brown tooth-like points, or scales, on a membrane at each joint. These membranes are the plants version of leaves. From these scales a whorl of cylindrical thin branches can emerge. Some stems may branch near the top. Fertile stems end in a small spore producing cone known as a Strobilus. Non-fertile stems look the same except lack the cone. Propagation: The plant grows and usually spreads from a rhizome in shallow water, less than 40" deep. It can be quite aggressive. The spores can also produce new plants. The genus name is Latin for "horsetail" and the species name refers to a river. These are ancient plants with distant relatives back in the Carboniferous period.


Above: Stems and tips of Water Horsetail. The "leaf" is actually the dark membrane that occurs at stem joints, from which can emerge the thin circular branches. Right and far below: Extensive growth of the plant in the bog area of the Garden.

Below: A fertile stem with the Strobilus on top and whorls of branches emerging from the scales on the membrane leaf.	Below: The Strobilus is the spore producing organ that appear on top of fertile stems. The spores are produced inside in a sporangia, similar to a fern.

Notes: Martha Crone does not list this plant on her 1951 Garden Census, but it is so prevalent in the bog area today that it may certainly have been established at that earlier time. She wrote about it in the October 1953 issue of The Fringed Gentian™, saying it is "the last remainder of the large trees of the carbon forests, propagating by spores and creeping rootstalks." See it on the bog path - Lady Slipper Lane. Native to most of Minnesota except the dryer parts of the SW quarter. The plant is on the endangered list in several New England States. It occurs in North America northward of a line from Oregon to Virginia.

Return to -- Site Plan/Archive --or-- List of Common Plant Names -- or -- List of Scientific Names -- or --Home Page

References: Plant characteristics are generally from sources 15, 16, 30, 31, 33, W2 & W3. Distribution principally from W2 and also 31, 34 and W1. Planting history generally from 1, 4 & 4a. Other sources by specific reference. See Reference List for details.

112412