This week for Flora and Fauna Friday, we have another wildflower important to pollinators. This week we’re talking about Seaside Goldenrod (Solidago sempervirens).
Seaside Goldenrod is a member of the Goldenrod genus, Solidago. Goldenrods, just like Asters, are a highly diverse group with members who all look very similar. There are over a dozen species found in our area. Goldenrods as a whole are tall, narrow plants with numerous rich, golden flowers. Hence the common name of “Golden Rods”. Seaside Goldenrod is no exception. Every Fall it produces long, single-stemmed flower stalks, capped with a cluster of small yellow flowers, that can reach 7 feet in height. It’s stems and leaves can turn red when the plant is in strong sunlight. It gets its specific epithet of “sempervirens”, which means “forever green”, from the almost succulent, evergreen leaves of its basal rosette. Unlike many Goldenrods, these leaves persist even after the flowers stalks die back in the winter. Seaside Goldenrod grows on the banks of brackish waters, edges of saltmarshes, and in dune ecosystems. It doesn’t grow in the marsh, like Sealavender or Saltmarsh Asters, but instead grows on high ground just above the high-water line. It can be found on the edges of hammocks, ditches, and impoundments where it grows alongside Baccharis, Fimbry, and Sea-Oxeye. Goldenrods as a group are a critical nectar source for bees, wasps, flies, and beetles at the end of the year’s growing season. Seaside Goldenrod is especially important as a nectar source for Monarchs and other migratory butterflies. As Monarchs migrate South for the winter, Seaside Goldenrod creates a golden river of nectar down the Eastern Seaboard.
