Well, on a recent bird-watching excursion among the cattails and the ducks, I found Yerba Mansa (Anemopsis californica), a member of the Lizard's-tail Family (Saururaceae).
Yerba Mansa is a late-spring to mid-summer bloomer, growing in both saline and alkaline marshy places. Its obvious white flowers aren't really obvious white flowers. Not entirely, anyway. Its obvious but not really obvious white flowers are a one to two inch spike of small flowers rising up from the center of several broad white petal-like bracts. (Fooled you!) Each tiny flower on the spike also has a small white bract beneath it.
The leaves are mostly oblong, and are up to six inches long. The entire plant grows to about a foot in height. Found throughout much of the southwest into Mexico, Yerba Mansa can also be found here and there in Oregon, Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Nebraska.
The family name is from the Greek Sauros, which means lizard, and oura, which means tail. The generic name for Yerba Mansa means "Like anemone." There are only five genera in the family, and only seven species in those. They are native to Asia and eastern and western North America.
The Costanoan Indians of California used a decoction of the roots as a general pain remedy, to wash sores, and to treat menstrual cramps. Dried and powdered, the roots were sprinkled on wounds as a disinfectant.
In Ethnobotany of Costanoan Indians, California, based on collections by John P. Harrington, Barbara Bocek wrote, " The peppery, aromatic root is astringent, and is chewed raw, after drying, for affections of the mucous membrane, and also made into a tea for purifying the blood."
Another aquatic plant I've come across - this one at the Asheville, North Carolina Botanical Gardens - is Golden-club (Orontium aquaticum), a member of the Arum Family (Araceae.) It is striking for its long, slender golden yellow spadix.
The entire plant is about two feet tall with leaves that can be up to a foot long. The leaves are above, or float on the water. Its minute flowers are clustered on the spadix. The undeveloped spathe looks like a narrow leaf sheath.
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