to boldly go

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This one is another import, its ancestry goes back to Europe as does mine, and now it's widely naturalized in North America as is my species.

The perennial creeps along slowly, often growing in cracks of rocks or masonry, in little or poor soil or no soil. Does it even need soil? You have to admire its fortitude, its insistence to live; its ability to thrive where another plant could not, would not, should not. But it does. You know, "boldly go where no one has gone before," (cue the Star Trek theme), perhaps that's why its yellow flowers are star shaped, like an open cluster in a far off galaxy.

Different sources give it a variety of common names: goldmoss stonecrop, goldmoss sedum, biting stonecrop, mossy stonecrop or even wallpepper. But in this case, perhaps its Latin name works best “Sedum acre," from the Latin "sedo" meaning "to sit." And left alone, in time, it just might fill an acre.

- Photo taken at Ijams Nature Center

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