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Witch Hazel
(Hamamelis virginiana)
From the Greek,hama meaning together, and melon meaning apple or fruit: it fruits and flowers together at the same time.
Chinese Witch Hazel
(Hamamelis mollis)
Witch Hazel has played an important part in Connecticut's history. The twigs were gathered for the bark which was distilled in factories to make a product that is still made and sold as a mild astringent. If you have ever visited the Essex Steam Train you would have been able to see the old Witch Hazel factory there. I believe the Connecticut's Native Americans used witch hazel for soothing inflammations.
A native plant.
Through the gray and sombre wood
Against the dusk of fir and pine
Last of their floral sisterhood
The hazel's yellow blossoms shine.
-John G. Whittier (The Hoosier poet...)
The above poem refers to the fact this plant blooms last of all shrubs each year,
somewhere in October and November.Our Schoolyard Habitat hopes to get a native Witch Hazel from my woods if I can find a young one...but until then we have 2 specimens of Chinese Witch Hazel (you guessed it! a native of China!). The native Witch Hazel is the last woody plant to bloom in New England each year. The native tree-like shrub to your right is about15 feet tall. It is about 10 feet wide. It lives in the shade of oaks and pines.
Witch Hazels can live in the sun if there is good soil and enough water. Some plants are pickier about where they are...so when you buy a plant be sure to research where it wants to go so it doesn't die. The Japanese Witch Hazel (H. japonica) is better for drier places.
This is one of our
Chinese Witch Hazels,
Hamamelis mollis.
This is the seed capsule
of the Chinese specie.
The Chinese specie is prized for its very fragrant flowers which are the biggest flowers found on any of the witch hazels. It is not as hardy as our native specie, Hamamelis virginiana, so sometimes the flower buds will die if it is too cold here. One way to tell the two species apart is that the one year old twigs on the Chinese plant are fuzzy with soft, short hairs (pubescent).
The woody seed capsule to the right has opened and shot its seeds to the woodland floor. I can't find it in any book here at the moment but I am fairly sure they do that. There are many funny stories of people picking the branches to put in arrangements in the house. Later, as the seed capsules dry and split open the family is scared to hear strange noises coming from the room where the witch hazel was put....the little seeds blasting off into the room, bouncing off things!
This is a green seed capsule on the native Witch Hazel. I only found two on the big shrub in the top picture.
Native witch hazel foliage seen from below.
This is the Chinese witch hazel.
March in a warm spring
About the name: In different books I read two very different reasons for the common name, Witch Hazel. In one book they said it was called Witch Hazel because dowsers (also called water witches) used the twigs to locate hidden sources of water. But then I read in Our Native Trees (1900), a book that seems to try hard to get to the bottom of things, that witch is a modern spelling of an old Saxon word "wich" or "wych". The meaning nowadays is not clear, with some experts thinking it used to refer to salt springs, and others thinking it refers to a pendulous, drooping look. Witch Haze lplants do have a drooping look. I have to go with the more boring, drooping explanation myself as it seems more likely. The author of that explanation, Harriet Keeler, went on to say she thought that the name "witch" may have attracted dowsers to the plant.
Study pointers:
- Next time you are at the grocery store, check the pharmacy aisle for witch hazel products. You will find them near the rubbing alcohol. Where is the company that makes it? What is it for?
- Compare the foliage of the two species. List the similarities. List the differences. (I'll get you a better picture so it is easier
.)
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