skunk cabbage

noun

a low, fetid, broad-leaved North American plant, Symplocarpus foetidus, of the arum family, having a brownish-purple and green mottled spathe surrounding a stout spadix, growing in moist ground.
a related plant, Lysichiton americanum, of western North America, having a cluster of green leaves and a spike of flowers surrounded by a yellow spathe.

skunk cabbage

a low-growing fetid aroid swamp plant, Symplocarpus foetidus of E North America, having broad leaves and minute flowers enclosed in a mottled greenish or purple spathe
a similar aroid plant, Lysichitum americanum, of the W coast of North America and N Asia

An Americanism dating back to 1745–55

From the smooth sumac they reap a harvest in midsummer, and in March they get a good grist of pollen from the skunk-cabbage.

Off in the ferns there beat a warning tattoo—the loud whir of the snake's tail against a skunk-cabbage leaf.

“I can pull out any skunk cabbage with my teeth,” said Deer.

The skunk cabbage raises his hooded head first in sheltered hollows.

Skunk-cabbage, you call it; so quaint a flower deserves a rather better name.

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