NEBRASKAland Magazine is dedicated to outstanding photography and informative writing with an engaging mix of articles and photos highlighting Nebraska’s outdoor activities, parklands, wildlife, history and people.
Issue link: http://mag.outdoornebraska.gov/i/1323352
42 Nebraskaland • January-February 2021 It's Snow on-the-Mountain Story and photos by Gerry Steinauer his past summer while taking a break during a plant survey in the loess hills of Custer County, my glance settled on a distant prairie hilltop. "That's strange; it's white," I thought. For a second or two my mind imagined snow. Then, I snapped back to reality, "It's August, dummy." After a few more moments of squinting and pondering, it all made sense. "It's a big patch of snow-on-the-mountain." The person who named the plant may have had a similar experience. A native annual found statewide, snow-on-the-mountain (Euphorbia marginata) thrives in disturbed habitats, such as abandoned farm fi elds, roadsides and prairie dog towns. The hilltop that temporarily baffl ed my senses had recently been cleared of eastern red-cedars and its exposed soil provided an ideal seed bed for this opportunistic plant. Bleeds White Cut the stem or leaf of snow-on-the- mountain and it bleeds a white, latex sap. The sap, which congeals after a few minutes exposure to air, contains bitter-tasting and irritating chemicals known as diterpenes. When the sap comes in contact with the mouth, eyes or skin of herbivores, it can cause infl ammation and blistering and dissuades grazing of the plant. Avoided by livestock, snow-on-the-mountain is also abundant in many overgrazed pastures. Old reports, whether fact or fi ction, claimed that cowboys used its sap to brand cattle. Although an irritant to humans sensitive to diterpenes, Great Plains tribes used snow-on-the-mountain as medicine. The Lakota, for example, used its crushed leaves as a liniment for swellings. Because of its sap's resemblance to milk, the Lakota also made a tea from the plant to treat mothers with insuffi cient breast milk. The Lakota have two names for snow- on-the-mountain. One name, "asan'pi peju'ta," translates to milk medicine, the other, "ito'pta sa'pa tapeju'ta" translates to black-footed ferret's medicine; the plant was abundant in prairie dog towns where the now- endangered ferret once lived and thrived. The animal is sacred to the Lakota. Strange Flowers Having no real sepals and petals, individual male and female snow-on- the-mountain fl owers are incredibly small and simple. The male fl owers, for instance, consist of a single, short pollen-bearing anther with a tiny bract at its base. Most plants with simple, non-showy fl owers, such as the ragweeds and lamb's quarters, produce prolifi c pollen that is randomly dispersed by the wind — not snow- on-the-mountain and other members T Snow-on-the-mountain contains a latex sap that can irritate the lips, eyes and skin of herbivores, as well as sensitive humans.