American water-willow, Justicia americana (L.) Vahl, is no doubt familiar to local fishermen even if they don’t know it
by name. It generally grows in standing
water usually up to about knee deep thus it can be found along the shoreline of lakes, larger permanent
streams and even on submerged islands.
It is a tough stemmed, colonial, emergent, aquatic weed that spreads with rhizomes as anybody that has ever lodged a fishing hook in one can attest.
I spent so much time fishing in and around it that I may have developed
an allergy with the worst part being hives in proportion to where I stayed wet the
longest, therefore I started using waders to prevent the rash from reoccurring. The dense patches of plants provide a sanctuary for various fish prey and thus attract the fish, which may use it as
a nursery or sanctuary themselves, thus attracting the fishermen. It would almost be as easy to tell somebody
where to fish by indicating this plant as when my uncle asked my now late maternal
grandfather, who had worked for TVA cutting trees, where to find stumps in
Lake Guntersville, and got the answer "Everywhere." Interestingly years before my
parents were even born a photo was taken of the TVA work crews on the
only day both my granddads were in the same one, but I digress. The common name water-willow is also used for swamp loosestrife, Decodon verticillatus (L.) Elliot, which is another colonial wetland indicator species that is instead in the same family as the persistent exotic species crepe myrtle, Lagerstroemia indica L. Due to the common name water-willow I was even confused Decadon for Justicia until very recently (thus having to correct this page) when realizing that two different plants had this common name besides both having several similarities such as leaf arrangement, colonial growth, and habitat preference. The most notable detail that separates the species is the flowers; although both are axillary Justicia flowers are mostly white and longer stalked while those of Decadon are pink and more like individual flowers of crepe myrtle.
