These are unusual, perhaps rare, all-yellow eastern skunk cabbage spathes. They’ve returned to the same area that they appeared in last year, when I first reported on them.
Usually, our skunk cabbage spathes are covered in seemingly random purple and yellow-green splotches:
It’s mysterious; I wonder if these swamp lemons are another Climate Change phenomenon, some kind of pigment problem. I also wonder if the coloring on the spathes is intended to attract pollinators.
These images were taken yesterday, but the spathes have been up about two weeks and have endured cold, high winds, and torrential rain. Skunk cabbages, which generate their own heat, are the first flowering plants to reappear here each year. The flowers are inside the pixie-hat-shaped spathes, into which our earliest pollinators (often flies) can crawl and be protected from the elements and predators. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on March 12, 2024.)