Skunk cabbage commands attention in late winter, when its mottled red-purple-brown spathe pushes up through frozen mud in bogs, swamps, and wet woodland floors. The hooded sheath surrounds a greenish-yellow spadix covered in tiny flowers, and the whole structure generates genuine metabolic heat, warming itself enough to melt surrounding snow and thaw the ground. The scent, which resembles decaying flesh, is the point: it attracts the early-season flies and gnats that serve as its pollinators.

By late spring, the flowers have faded and enormous, deeply veined, heart-shaped leaves emerge, growing 2 to 3 feet tall and filling wet corners of the landscape with a tropical-looking presence. Native to bogs, swamps, and wet meadows across eastern North America, it grows in zones 4 through 7 and requires consistently saturated or very wet soil. Transplanting is nearly impossible once established because the contractile roots pull the crown deep into the ground. Skunk cabbage is a plant to position thoughtfully, then leave alone to do what it has always done.