This is a good time to see devil’s walking sticks in the forest. Aralia spinosa is a scrawny plant. It usually has one stalk and is usually branchless. It’s about the size of a broom handle, but it’s covered in thorns that rival cactus spines for ferocity. At the top of the stalk is a crown. Most of the plants I see are 10 or 12 feet high.
When you look at the crown, what you think you see is a bunch of small leaves on top of the scrawny stalk. But you are seeing leaflets, not leaves. If you trace the leaflets from branching stem to stem, you will gradually see that you are looking at one big leaf. These are the largest leaves in forest of the Piedmont. The ones I saw were about 4-by-3 feet.
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