One “big brute” that loves boggy conditions is the yellow skunk cabbage, Lysichiton americanus, which announces itself with huge sulphur-coloured flowers in spring.

Little did I know that I had a 1,700-foot climb ahead of me, up wooden planks and through pastures of melting snow and bright yellow skunk cabbage.

In the cedar wetlands, spikes of bright yellow skunk cabbage tower above delicate plants like creeping and western buttercup, false lily-of-the-valley, foam flower and yellow wood violets.

Contrary to popular belief, the western skunk cabbage, a close relative from the Araceae family is not thermogenic.

The branches were used as brooms, and the twigs were used to fasten western skunk cabbage leaves into berry baskets.

Manzanita, hazelnut, vine maple, western skunk cabbage, and multiple species of berries and grasses make up the understory.

They may inhabit forests of red alder, bigleaf maple, western hemlock or redcedar, often near marshes with western skunk cabbage.

Western Skunk Cabbage: A related plant (in the same genus) from North America, which is known for producing a foul smell.

Lysichiton americanum, western skunk cabbage, Araceae, Pelecomalius testaceum, southeast Alaska, pollination.

The common name "skunk cabbage" is used for the genus Lysichiton, which includes L. americanus, the western skunk cabbage, noted for its unpleasant smell.

While the foetid western Skunk Cabbage produces heat, melting the Scottish and English winter snow around it, its eastern cousin was listed by the US Pharmacopoeia in the 19th century as the drug draconium.

Caution should be used in attempts to prepare western skunk cabbage for consumption, as it contains calcium oxalate crystals, which result in a gruesome prickling sensation on the tongue and throat and can result in intestinal irritation and even death if consumed in large quantities.