Why is the mountain laurel pennsylvania state flower
Explore! ➡️ State Flower: Mountain Laurel
Pennsylvania is all around us and we
want to help you to explore our state
hi I'm Beth Erickson museum educator at
the State Museum of Pennsylvania join me
today as we explore the state symbols of
Pennsylvania Pennsylvania is home to
many flowers if you had to pick a
favorite flower to represent the state
what would you choose
rhododendron dandelion chirp I read that
one has a funny name well the selection
of the state flower of Pennsylvania was
not a smooth process it started in 1927
when the Pennsylvania General Assembly
considered adopting the tulip tree and
the flower of the tulip tree as
Pennsylvania's official state tree and
flower the legislation was considered a
great length but in the end no action
was taken so in 1933 they tried again
but the General Assembly was still
unable to reach an agreement so this
time they passed two bills for state
flowers one bill for the mountain laurel
and the other for the pink azalea and
deferred the decision-making to the
governor at that time gifford pinchot so
how did the governor decide which bill
to sign into law well no one knows for
sure but there is a story that governor
Pinchot preferred the pink Azalea but
his wife Cornelia preferred the mountain
laurel regardless of how it was decided
on May 5th 1933 governor gifford pinchot
signed the mountain laurel bill into law
declaring it the state flower of
pennsylvania the state of connecticut
also chose the mountain laurel as their
state flower mountain laurel is found
throughout the state and is part of
Pennsylvania's history in the early 18th
century mountain laurel was cultivated
as a flowering ornamental and was used
as decoration especially for holiday
wreaths and floral arrangements it was
even exported for use as an exotic
flower in English gardens looming in the
spring it is one of the few broad-leaved
native plants that does not lose its
leaves in winter mountain laurel is a
woody plant and member of the heath
family which also includes azaleas
blueberries cranberries huckleberries
and rhododendron mountain laurel may be
beautiful but it can also be deadly it
turns out that all green parts of the
plant are poisonous and can be fatal
well not everything beautiful is good to
eat the mountain laurel also has a
unique adaptation to dispense pollen so
we know that flowers need pollen to
reproduce and the flowers have
reproductive parts an individual
mountain laurel flower has ten filaments
and anthers which hold the pollen as the
flower blooms the filaments are pulled
backward in an arc creating a hair light
trigger the filaments are under tension
ready to launch pollen into the air when
a pollinator begins to explore the
flower its weight releases the stamen
and the filament hurls or catapults the
pollen at up to eight miles per hour
toward the center of the flower hitting
the underside of the pollinator the
catapult ensures that the pollinator
contacts the pollen and promotes the
future reproduction of mountain laurel
flowers
who doesn't like a catapult I guess that
cool feature makes up for the horrible
poisoning possibility so the next time
you were out for a walk in tens woods
look for our state flower the mountain
laurel near the edge of the forest or on
a wooded hillside but watch out for that
catapult pollen save that for the bees I
hope you enjoyed learning about the
mountain Laura flower and its selection
as a state flower of Pennsylvania visit
our web page for more on how to make a
pollen catapult
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