The first picture is the elderberries. This bush is over where my 7 y/o Newfoundland, Morgan, likes to sleep. It is the only elderberry patch that the berries stay on until I can use them. This photo was taken today, September 10th, 2008. The berries are ripe, and hanging heavy. Many have dropped to the ground. They are also covered in pollen.
The second picture is the plant whose pollen the elderberries were well dusted with. As a matter of fact, while I was picking berries, and stepped on the stalks of this plant, the pollen filled the aire like mist. It worried me a little since I was about to make jelly with berries literally caked with this pollen. So I spent about an hour going through my books identifying the plant. It reminded me of ragweed, but I knew it wasn't - at least not the real stuff. I seemed to recall someone calling it "Indian Hemp." Repeated googling came up with duds. I finally found it online with the words three-lobed leaf invasive weeds pollen, or some such thing. You can't tell by my picture, but the leaves have distinctive lobes.
It is Ambrosia trifida, in the aster family.
It has many common names:
Giant Ragweed (gut instincts are sometimes right!)
Wild Hemp (hey, that too!)
Buffalo Weed
Horse Cane
Tall Ambrosia
Bitterweed
Bloodweed
With some further googling of the latin name along with the word pollen, poison, and so forth, I learned that the pollen is actually used as a treatment, ingested, for ragweed allergies. And bees use the pollen. I am curious how the hemp got in there, and am wondering if I can use this as a fiber also; possibly in basket weaving or making rope. But I was satisfied the pollen was harmless. So I was satisfied to go on and make my jelly with Ambrosia trifida dusted black elderberries.
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