Butterbur

Petasites hybridus. Not to be confused with White Butterbur which I blipped a few weeks ago.

This is an interesting plant because the flowers push up out of the earth before the leaves appear. The same happens with Colt’s-foot.
One wonders why this should happen.

It happens on many blossom trees of course and I have read articles about that which talk about the flowers being able to grow in lower temperatures than the leaves.

I have a theory that in the case of the Butterbur it relates to the fact that once the leaves start to grow they do so very fast and they grow to be very large. Indeed the plant is sometimes known as giant rhubarb and the leaves are used as sunshades or umbrellas.

This means that very rapidly they cover the flowers and this makes them much less obvious to pollinators.

Somebody out there may know another reason and I would be interested to hear any theories or facts.