Flowering Plants (14)
January 15, 2007
Colchicum sp.
A thank you to Hampshire, England's “Souren” for sharing this photograph via the UBC Botanical Garden Forums. These photographs were taken in September of 2006, in the Kharkiv University Botanical Garden (Ukraine). Much appreciated!
The alkaloid colchicine was first derived from plants in the genus Colchicum, hence the name. In addition to the medicinal uses outlined in the link, colchicine is extremely important in plant breeding research. If applied properly, a colchicine treatment can lead to a doubling of chromosomes in (half of the) gametes, resulting in offspring that are polyploid, or plants that have more than two similar sets of chromosomes.
Polyploidy is important for plant breeding in two respects. First of all, polyploids tend to be more robust than the diploid progenitors. As noted in the Wikipedia entry on polyploidy, many important crops were (unintentionally) bred to be polyploid: apple, banana, durum, maize, cotton, potato, tobacco, strawberry, sugar cane, etc. Compare wild strawberries to domesticated varieties, and you'll understand what's meant by more robust! Colchicine, by helping to induce polyploidy, can help create new ornamental or food varieties of plants. A second use of colchicine in plant breeding work is to overcome hybrid sterility, as is done with triticale.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (9)
January 7, 2007
Hosta sieboldiana var. gigantea
From December 16, 2006 to January 14, 2007, Botany Photo of the Day is going to be featuring photo abstracts posted with little or no scientific commentary. If abstracts aren't to your taste, please consider revisiting the site in mid-January. – Daniel
A photo from mid-October.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 1:01 AM| Comments (4)
January 3, 2007
Rubus thibetanus 'Silver Fern'
From December 16, 2006 to January 14, 2007, Botany Photo of the Day is going to be featuring photo abstracts posted with little or no scientific commentary. If abstracts aren't to your taste, please consider revisiting the site in mid-January. – Daniel
This bramble is the source of much recent photographic frustration for me. It beckons outside my second-floor office window with its tangled icy-blue mass of canes, asking to be photographed in pretty much the exact frame that I see through the window from my office chair – a window that only opens thirty degrees outwards, thereby requiring me to either 1) move furniture and lean out the window while undergoing unnatural contortions (which I suspect the safety folks might have something to say about); 2) take the photograph through the window glass (and accept some glare and reduced image quality); or 3) let it taunt me. I wonder if I can get away with propping a ladder against the side of the building...
This shot was from a much closer distance, with a new lens.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (4)
December 18, 2006
Trachycarpus fortunei
From December 16, 2006 to January 14, 2007, Botany Photo of the Day is going to be featuring photo abstracts posted with little or no scientific commentary. If abstracts aren't to your taste, please consider revisiting the site in mid-January. – Daniel
In infrared. Previously featured on BPotD here: Trachycarpus fortunei.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (6)
December 15, 2006
Ipomopsis aggregata
Scarlet gilia is a native of western North America with a distribution range stretching from British Columbia south to Mexico. According to the Plants for a Future database, the crushed leaves smell like skunk. I wouldn't know, as I was intent on both photographing the plant and being vigilant of my surroundings. Looking back to when I took this image, it was likely the most endangered I felt in 2006 while taking photographs.
Realistically, I was most in danger of being injured when I was walking on unstable rocks and boulders in the rock slide area where I took this photo of Acer circinatum. However, this image of Ipomopsis aggregata was taken while standing in a small ditch between a highway and rocky slope (there was a barrier between the ditch and highway) with semis roaring behind me – a bit unnerving, and certainly distracting. When I returned to the car after the session, I was informed I was bleeding from my legs. Between concentrating on the photographs and keeping an eye out for the relative impossibility of a semi jumping the barrier, I hadn't noticed that the rocks on the slope I was kneeling against had punctured skin.
As noted in the Jepson Manual, the genus Ipomopsis can be found throughout most of southern North America, but at least one species resides in southern South America. I've yet to find a reference explaining the broad, disjunct distribution of the genus.
If you're searching for more images of this species, there's the always-reliable Burke Museum of Natural History: Ipomopsis aggregata.
On the topic of the next few weeks, I'd like to first note that I will be around, so please don't hesitate to comment on or discuss any BPotD entries. In anticipation of not writing much in the next month of BPotD, I'll add this now: thank you to all of you for your support of BPotD and the kind words you send along behind the scenes. It is very much appreciated.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (7)
December 14, 2006
Berberis wilsoniae
The last reader-contributed photograph (original image) of 2006 is supplied by Eric in SF@Flickr. After tomorrow's entry, I'm taking a “writing vacation” from BPotD until January 15, 2007. For the next four weeks, I'll be posting some of my abstract botanical / landscape photographs from 2006 with little or no scientific commentary. If abstracts aren't to your liking, I hope you'll revisit the site in the middle of January when BPotD returns to its more traditional format.
In addition to relaying my thanks to Eric for today's photograph (thank you, Eric!), I'd also like to thank everyone who has submitted photographs for BPotD since its inception. For those who have submitted, you may have noted I can't use every photograph (whether it be for size, or repetition, or lack of imagination on my part to write something about the subject), but I do want to state that I appreciate your generosity and thoughtfulness. Thank you to all of you.
Wilson's barberry is named after the wife of the famous plant explorer, E.H. Wilson (thanks Greg and Peter – see comments below re: my mistake). If you're researching the plant online, it is important that you also search for a misspelling of the scientific name, Berberis wilsonii, a common error which had creeped into the Wikipedia article on Berberis (though I've now corrected it).
Eric also has a photograph of the flowers on Flickr. You may note the strong resemblance to the flowers of Mahonia – Douglas's comment on the Mahonia entry explains some of the differences between the two genera.
If you're interested in reading more about the area of China where Berberis wilsoniae can be found (and some of E.H. Wilson's adventures), Discover magazine published “The Mother of Gardens” in August 2005.
Lastly, I submitted the recent photograph of the varied thrush and Chinese mountain ash to the I and the Bird Blog Carnival, “a carnival celebrating the interaction of human and avian, an ongoing exploration of the endless fascination with birdlife all around the world”. It's made an appearance in the text of I and the Bird 38 on the Ben Cruachan Blog. If you're interested in birds at all, I and the Bird is certainly worth following.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 5:30 AM| Comments (8)
December 13, 2006
Crataegus douglasii
Many thanks to Lotus J. aka ngawangchodron@Flickr for sharing today's photograph with us (via BPotD Flickr Group Pool | original image) – appreciated, as always.
How many species of Crataegus (or hawthorns) exist? The answer is, “It depends on what you mean by species.” Depending on the taxonomic interpretation, there may be a couple hundred species or there may be over a thousand. Charles Sargent, first director of the Arnold Arboretum, described 732 new species. Dr. Tim Dickinson of the University of Toronto cites W.H. Camp as pronouncing the determination of number of species as “The Crataegus Problem”.
Dr. Dickinson provides excellent resources about hawthorns on his lab and teaching site. A broad description of hawthorns is available on this page: Crataegus. A paper specifically about the black-fruited hawthorns (of which Crataegus douglasii is one) can be found here: North American Black-Fruited Hawthorns.
Landscape architecture / art / design resource link: Pruned, recently listed as one of the Best Blogs of 2006 That You (Maybe) Aren't Reading. Hours and hours of readings and wanderings available here.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (8)
December 12, 2006
Joshua Tree National Park
One of four US National Parks (+ 1 US Nat'l Monument) named after plants, the roughly 800 000 acres (324 000 ha) of Joshua Tree National Park is solely located in southern California. Despite its size, that's less than 1 acre for each annual visitor – 1.25 million. Many of the visitors are photographers, and the body of photographs for this place reminds me of a question asked by Guy Tal in his essay: “Does the World Need Another Aspen Image?” (applied to the Joshua trees, of course).
Excellent descriptions of Yucca brevifolia can be found in the Flora of North America and Wikipedia.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:16 AM| Comments (5)
December 10, 2006
Cypripedium parviflorum var. pubescens
I spent most of the past eight hours preparing BPotD entries for my upcoming vacation from BPotD, so I've selected an image of a previously featured plant today. To learn more about the greater yellow lady's slipper, visit the BPotD entry from October 2005: Cypripedium parviflorum var. pubescens.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 1:18 AM| Comments (3)
December 9, 2006
Puya santosii
You receive a special treat today from Andreas of Bogotá (aka Quimbaya@Flickr | original image 1 | original image 2 |BPotD Flickr Group Pool). I know I'm not likely to ever see this in the wild, so I'm thankful for your sharing, Andreas! (As an aside, Andreas, Steve Swinscoe is trying to contact you re: Ceroxylon quindiuense).
There is very little online information about this rare species. For example, other than a few small photographs in the Flora Illustrada del Páramo de Chingaza (here), what you see today is the extent of what's available online for images.
I did find one species-specific tidbit of information from – believe it or not – the California Department of Fish and Game; it appears California DFG hosted an international conference on bears. This PDF on bear habitat assessment posters displayed at the conference makes mention (page 11) of research about the spectacled bear and its role as a dispersal agent for seeds in its habitat, including the seeds of Puya santosii. I imagine Puya santosii is not the only bromeliad to benefit – plants in the family Bromeliaceae are an important component in the diet of this second-most endangered bear species in the world.
Photography resource link: for inspiration, Daily Walks, the photography of Californian Diane Varner. After spending some time viewing the photographs, you might be curious to read about Diane and her postprocessing technique.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:29 AM| Comments (5)
December 8, 2006
Echinocereus rigidissimus (likely var. rubrispinus)
A thank you to billy liar@Flickr (starter of the Flickr “Fat Plants” group) for sharing today's photograph (BPotD Flickr Group Pool | original image). Much appreciated!
The simplest name to apply to this plant is the common one: rainbow hedgehog cactus. I made an attempt to figure out the most recent accepted scientific name and had to abandon it. “billy liar” stated this plant's name was Echinocereus rigidissimus var. rubrispinus (the varietal epithet meaning red-spined), but when checking the nomenclature, I ran into a few problems. The USDA Plants Database entry on Echinocereus rigidissimus doesn't subdivide the species into subspecies or varieties. However, the distribution of this taxon extends from southwest USA into Mexico, so it is quite possible that the variety rubrispinus only occurs in Mexico, and so wouldn't be covered in the USDA database.
This does seem to be the case after browsing through Echinocereus Online where it lists the taxon Echinocereus pectinatus var. rubispinus as occurring in Chihuahua, Mexico. This reference suggests that Echinocereus rigidissimus var. rubrispinus is an outdated name. However, looking back at the USDA database, it seems those taxonomists would make the opposite conclusion, based on their listing of Echinocereus pectinatus var. rigidissimus as a synonym for Echinocereus rigidissimus. Conclusion? Confused.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:36 AM| Comments (4)
December 7, 2006
Alnus incana subsp. tenuifolia
Stumps with the jarring linear patterns of chainsaw cuts are one of the sad results of last week's storm at UBC Botanical Garden. Now that most of the snow is melted, it is easier to assess some of the damage to the plant collections (another round of losses will take a couple months to determine – damage from temperature). My unprofessional observations, confirmed in a casual conservation with one of the horticulturists, suggest the following numbers:
- 1) the low dozens of woody plants need to be removed outright
- 2) woody plants with minor to severe damage number in the hundreds
- 3) if the garden had a formal design, where plants had to be replaced by others of the same species and a similar size or shape to retain structure, the assessed damage would be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars
Since the garden components with the most damage tend to be more informal or naturalistic in design, the lost plants yield an opportunity to grow something different in those areas. Still, the cost to the garden in the lost investment of time into the plants (growing, pruning, interpretation, labelling and so on), the replacement cost of new plants and the time to clean up the damage (time taken away from other projects) will easily run into the tens of thousands of dollars.
I generally try to avoid pop culture references on BPotD, but I have to admit to thinking of Treebeard's rumblings when I walk around the garden: “Many of these trees were my friends” (from the Lord of the Rings movies).
Thinleaf alder (the subspecies tenuifolia) is native only to northwestern North America, while the broader range of the entire species spans much of North America and Europe. The Flora of North America reports on this taxon: Alnus incana subsp. tenuifolia. The Burke Museum unfailingly contains an excellent set of images: Alnus incana subsp. tenuifolia.
Botany resource link: Weeds of Mexico (Malezas de México), a project by Dr. Heike Vibrans Lindemann of the Colegio de Postgraduados en Ciencias Agrícolas. The site contains factsheets and photographs on over three hundred species in a clean, easily-navigable format. If you've time to spare and can translate between Spanish and English, you can help the project by offering to translate the Spanish factsheets into English.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:39 AM| Comments (7)
December 4, 2006
Hesperantha coccinea
A shot of colour today from two months ago.
Names galore for this species. The long-standing scientific name Schizostylis coccinea has been dropped by many in favour of Hesperantha coccinea. Eric La Fountaine cites the relevant papers here, while a quick summary of the rationale behind the name change is available from the Pacific Bulb Society's mailing list archives.
The common name is also the subject of some disagreement. The South African National Biodiversity Institute uses river lily. Similarly, the Pacific Bulb Society prefers scarlet river lily. On the other hand, Wikipedia notes Kaffir lily as a common name; personally, I'd avoid this, now that I've learned how kaffir is an ethnic slur.
Art resource link: While at an art supply store on the weekend, I noticed a poster advertising an upcoming art show and sale by local painter Rachel Daws. Visit the paintings and recent work to jump straight in.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:31 AM| Comments (2)
December 3, 2006
Musa (unknown hybrid)
Today's photograph is courtesy of Mary Farmer, aka miconia@Flickr (BPotD Flickr Group Pool | original image). Mary has diligently and expertly documented the development of flowers on the banana plant in her Panama backyard, using both photographs and words. I find the whole set of photographs fascinating, so I highly recommend spending the time to browse through them.
Mary expands her commentary on this banana plant and other Panamian plants she encounters in her weblog, A Neotropical Savanna. Again, well worth visiting, as she invites you along on her journey to learn about tropical plants.
Bananas and banana plants have previously been featured on BPotD here and here, so I won't repeat the excellent links contained in those entries today.
Photography resource link: Eric Fredine has updated his web site with photographs from his newest exhibition, Horizons. I briefly entertained the thought of flying to Edmonton to see the exhibit (he is one of my favourite photographers), but I thought it more environmentally-sensible to wait until circumstances necessitated a trip. The web exhibit will do for now!
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:13 AM| Comments (1)
December 2, 2006
Nicotiana glauca
Many thanks to Dale Hameister (Dale Hameister@Flickr) for contributing today's image (original photograph | BPotD Flickr Group Pool). Much appreciated!
The highly poisonous tree tobacco is native to Bolivia and Argentina, but it has naturalized elsewhere, including Hawaii, southern USA and the Mediterranean. Cal Lemke's Plant of the Week highlighted Nicotiana glauca 6.5 (!) years ago, so do visit PotW for more info.
On another topic, I mentioned the Festival of the Trees blog carnival a few weeks ago. I submitted this BPotD entry on Thuja plicata for yesterday's festival, and it made it in. Go check it out: Festival of the Trees 6 at Arboreality. Be warned: there are a lot of fine links in this edition, and you'll find your weekend slipping away.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (6)
December 1, 2006
Sorbus hupehensis
It was something special to stand near this Chinese mountain ash on Wednesday morning. While most of the garden was still and (dare I say it) frozen, this tree was alive with activity. Thirty American robins (Turdus migratorius) or so and three varied thrushes (Ixoreus naevius) assembled on it, eating the fruit. Although a few birds would sit on the branches of the tree and down a half-dozen or more fruit before flying off briefly, the more timid of the birds would swoop in, pluck a fruit, and return to perch on neighbouring more-sheltered conifers. The effect was a small scene full of motion, which I was not expert enough to express in photographs. Sound was also present – a stream flows nearby, and its gurgle was interrupted with the hushed punctuation of flapping wings and, not very often, the occasional vocals of the robins and varied thrushes.
The snow beneath the tree was also marked by the activity, with fallen fruit and chunks of icy snow creating a pock-marked scene unlike anywhere else I observed in the garden that day. There was also an odd smell (again, the only one I noted while taking photographs); it took me back about 17 or 18 years, to when I used to shovel grain on the farm. The grain bins would sometimes leak, and there would be a small clump in the pile of grain where the water caused a mix of germinated seeds and mould to mass together. These had to be shovelled out and tossed aside, but the smell from disturbing them was the same smell I noticed under the Sorbus hupehensis. Strange.
Photography / art resource link: I linked to the photography of Edward Burtynsky earlier this year in this entry – if you felt a connection to his photographs, you might consider seeing the documentary Manufactured Landscapes. The film follows Burtynsky as he travels in China, and has just been nominated in the documentary category in the Sundance Film Festival.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:54 AM| Comments (17)
November 28, 2006
Enkianthus campanulatus
Thanks to an early (and heavy) snowfall in Vancouver, snow-laden trees broke powerlines supplying the UBC campus somewhere around 3 AM local time on November 27. No power, no functioning web server! When power was restored yesterday at 5 PM, the server also didn't restart automatically as it should due to a failure of an external component. It had to wait to be restarted manually, so that's why the web site came back online today at 8 AM. C'est la vie!
Today's duotone image was taken in the Asian Garden on the day before the snow started falling, last Friday. Redvein enkianthus was previously featured on Botany Photo of the Day (May 13, 2005), so do visit that entry if you'd like to see the flowers of the plant.
If you're considering growing the plant, reading the information on the Kemper Center for Home Gardening would be helpful. For an even more detailed horticultural examination of the plant, Washington State University's Extension Service has a Plant of the Month entry for Enkianthus campanulatus.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 8:18 AM| Comments (7)
November 27, 2006
Callitriche stagnalis
One kind of folk taxonomy divides plants into three groups: plants we adore, plants we abhor and plants we ignore. Pond water-starwort is surely in the third group, along with many other little-acknowledged freshwater aquatic plants. Still, admirers exist.
One example: when Richard Lansdown, the world expert on Callitriche species, visited UBC Botanical Garden earlier this year, he called this particular variant of Callitriche stagnalis the most beautiful he's ever seen. Unfortunately, the information about whether this variant is from a local population or “wild” collected elsewhere in British Columbia (it is not native to BC, hence the “wild”) was lost when the curator of the Native Garden vanished more than a decade ago.
A second example of admiration: the name Callitriche means “beautiful hair”, which, according to the Jepson Manual entry, is a reference to its slender stems.
For more information on pond water-starwort, visit the Skye Flora page on Callitriche stagnalis. If you would like to learn more broadly about how some species of plants have evolved to survive underwater, I recommend visiting the Mildred E. Mathias Botanical Garden's page on freshwater aquatic plants; it discusses many aspects of the specialized adaptations required for life in a medium different than air.
On a different tack, the garden is venturing into e-commerce territory with the opening of the UBC Botanical Garden Cafepress Store. The store includes a section for Botany Photo of the Day images; in addition to the existing 2007 calendar, I'll be adding cards and prints over the next week. I'll post more information about the store in the next couple of days, too.
Botany resource link: The island of Rum was made (botanically) infamous when it was discovered to be the site of botanical fraud. If you haven't read the book “A Rum Affair” (and I'll admit that I haven't), you can learn more about this story from the BBC or Watsonia, the journal of the Botanical Society of the British Isles.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (7)
November 26, 2006
Paeonia peregrina
A special thank you to those who commented on yesterday's photograph. I appreciate the gist of what you've expressed, and I'll not forget or ignore it. I'm keeping my word re: today's photograph though, as I could use a bit of colour myself. We're likely to have the coldest temperature we've had in a long while in Vancouver in the next couple days, so it's particularly delicious (and escapist) to revisit summertime now. Today's photograph was taken half a revolution ago.
Paeonia peregrina seems to have a few English common names. Balkan peony is a reference to its distributional range in southeastern Europe and Turkey. Dr. Allan Armitage calls it “poison peony” in his set of horticultural stock images, but that name doesn't appear elsewhere online. Personally, I'd opt to use a translation of the epithet peregrina to create the common name, which doesn't seem to have been done in English. This seems to have been the practice in French, though: pivoine étrangère, or strange peony. Such a common name would demand an explanation of why this particular species was considered strange or foreign to botanists of the time. Unfortunately, I don't have an answer today, but I'll check some reference works tomorrow to see if I can figure it out.
Photographs of the foliage and fully open flowers are available from both the Pacific Bulb Society and Floral Images.
Lastly, a head's up. I've decided to take a “vacation” from BPotD between December 16 and January 14. Although there will still be a daily photograph, two things will be different: 1) the photographs will be a series of abstracts and 2) I am going to post without scientific comment (the vacation part). Many of the abstracts have literal counterparts previously featured on BPotD, so I will reference those if available. If you're not a fan of abstracts, I hope you'll be able to be patient until mid-January.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 5:35 AM| Comments (7)
November 24, 2006
Asclepias fascicularis
Send some warm thoughts to Cliff aka The Marmot@Flickr, since he's shared this photograph (original image) with us via the Flickr BPotD Group Pool. Cliff's organized a Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden Flickr set, if you're interested in seeing other images from RSABG. Thanks Cliff!
Calflora.net points out that fascicularis means bundled, referring to the attachment of leaves to the stem. Cliff's photograph gives a sense of this, though it is perhaps more clear in the series of photographs accompanying Burke Museum's page on Asclepias fascicularis. If you browse these photographs, you'll note that more than two leaves are attached at each node of the stem, a leaf arrangement termed whorled. This explains one of the common names of this species, Mexican whorled milkweed, though narrow-leaved milkweed is also used.
To learn more about this western US and northwest Mexico native, visit the photo database at Calphotos (Asclepias fascicularis search) or read a description of the plant on Calflora.net's page on narrow-leaved milkweed.
Photography resource link: The Landscapist is “intended to showcase the landscape photography of photographers who have moved beyond the pretty picture and for whom photography is more than entertainment”. Not your typical photo weblog!
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 5:59 AM| Comments (1)
November 23, 2006
Muehlenbeckia axillaris
How does one take a good photograph of a plant that is a large creeping mat? In thirty years, this sprawling wirevine (or creeping pohuehue) has covered an area of more than 9 m2 (over 97 sq. ft.!) in the Australasian section of the Alpine Garden. I will need to consider how to take a photograph that captures the full extent and habit of the plant to share later, but in the meantime, I have these closeups. At the least, you'll have an idea of its rich autumn colour in scattered shade.
Since there is little to judge scale with in the photographs, I need to mention that the upright stems reach only 5cm (2in.) or so high. These stems are densely packed together (hence the term mat). In the first photograph, I estimate three to four thousand stems are present in the frame.
The Plants for a Future database notes the edibility of the fruit of this Australian and New Zealand native, while a description of the plant is available from the New South Wales Flora Online: Muehlenbeckia axillaris.
Lastly, if I were to title the first photograph, I'd call it “Lightfall”, since it reminds me of a waterfall of light.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 1:00 AM| Comments (2)
November 22, 2006
Caesalpinia pulcherrima
Today's photograph was submitted by Martin LaBar of southern California South Carolina (aka Martin LaBar@Flickr (original image | Flickr BPotD Group Pool). Martin has a number of plant and plant-related photographs in his Flickr photo sets, so do visit them if you have the opportunity. Thank you, Martin!
“Probably originating from Mexico or Guatemala” is the native origin suggested by a reference for Caesalpinia pulcherrima in the International Legume Database & Information Service (ILDIS). However, much like Lantana camara, red bird of paradise or Barbados pride has been introduced to so many warm places around the Earth, its distribution should now be considered purely pantropical.
The Wikipedia entry on Caesalpinia pulcherrima links to this interesting article by Dr. S. Allen Counter (a professor of neurology and neurophysiology at Harvard Medical School) in the Boston Globe: Amazing Mystery. Dr. Counter details the medicinal properties of Caesalpinia pulcherrima and asks the question of how indigenous knowledge can (and so very often does) precede Western medicine's knowledge of the human health uses of a plant.
Photography resource link: Musings on Photography is a weblog by Paul Butzi of Carnation, Washington. Its tagline, “Musings on photography from an artist perspective and art from a photographer perspective”, gives you an idea of what you'll experience if you visit the site.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:11 AM| Comments (7)
November 21, 2006
Juncus sp.
Yesterday's walkabout in the garden yielded the discovery of only a few scattered and tattered flowers, so I turned my attention elsewhere. The combination of rushes and reflections in this small pond in the Alpine Garden was photographed as a result.
Members of the rush family, Juncaceae, are found on every continent except Antarctica. However, because they tend to be associated with water, it is easy to explain their collective absence from the deserts of Africa, central Australia and Greenland. Not so easy to explain is the fact that they are found in most tropical areas except the Amazon rainforest and Madagascar. I imagine there is a biogeographical hypothesis for the lack of Juncaceae on Madagascar, but I personally can't come up with a plausible bit of speculation regarding the Amazon.
Despite Juncaceae's wide distribution, two related plant families have an even broader distribution, encompassing all areas of the world except for Antarctica and the frozen desert of Greenland: Poaceae and Cyperaceae (the grasses and the sedges).
To a casual observer, sedges, grasses and rushes all resemble each other (long, thin leaves & small flowers), so you might be asking yourself “How do I tell them apart?” A mnemonic taught to most botany students gives some hints: “sedges have edges, and rushes are round, but grasses have nodes from their tips to the ground”. For an explanation, visit University of California Museum of Paleontology's page on Glumiflorae.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:24 AM| Comments (11)
November 19, 2006
Blandfordia nobilis
A thank you to Australia's Ken Beath, aka kjbeath@Flickr for today's photograph of an Australian native plant (original image via the Flickr BPotD Group Pool). Ken also has a web site, complete with photo galleries. The image is much appreciated, Ken!
As Ken notes, the common name for this plant is Christmas bells, due to the time of year it flowers in its native New South Wales. According to the Pacific Bulb Society's page on Blandfordia, the four species in the genus Blandfordia may also be collectively known as Christmas bells, so that is worth noting if you intend to source this plant for your garden and you prefer common names.
Like many Australian plants, the history of this species in both botany and horticulture contains the words “Britain” and “English”. Tony Cavanagh of The Society for Growing Australian Plants has written an excellent summary of the history of the genus Blandfordia, complete with English botanists, horticulturists and nobles. If you're more interested in the plant itself, the Australian National Botanic Gardens has produced this factsheet on Blandfordia nobilis.
Botany resource link: I linked to University of Connecticut's EEB Plant Growth Facilities yesterday, but I thought I'd point out this in particular today: Pollination Syndromes is a categorical listing of different modes of pollination (by wind, by bat, etc.) accompanied by links to factsheets about the plants in the EEB Plant Growth Facilities currently in flower. The result of aggregating this information is a very handy way of comparing pollination syndromes.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (3)
November 18, 2006
Nepenthes ×ventrata
Updated January 19, 2007 at 1:07PM local time: I've changed this entry from Nepenthes alata to Nepenthes ×ventrata after the recently received comment and a review of these plants. The accompanying text remains somewhat pertinent, though still more relevant to Nepenthes alata. – Daniel
Another thank you to Monika (aka monika&manfred@Flickr) for submitting a photograph for use on BPotD (original image) – I'm very grateful!
Winged nepenthes, or winged tropical pitcher plant, is native to the Malay Archipelago. A question not addressed in last month's BPotD entry on Nepenthes sibuyanensis is how the pitchers grow and develop in this genus at the cellular and tissue level. Fortunately, a paper exists about these highly modified leaves: Owen, TP Jr. and KA Lennon. 1999. Structure and development of the pitchers from the carnivorous plant Nepenthes alata (Nepenthaceae) (PDF link). American Journal of Botany 86(10):1382-1390. It is intriguing to read how slight variations of what might be considered a typical leaf can be combined to produce this complex modified organ.
A few more links to visit: the Ecology & Evolutionary Biology Plant Growth Facilities at the University of Connecticut has an entry on Nepenthes alata with information about its native habitat. Wikipedia also has an extensive article on Nepenthes, and notes that Nepenthes alata is one of the easier species to grow in cultivation (like the plant in today's photograph).
Photography resource link: “The Eye and The Camera”, an article by Alain Briot for The Luminous Landscape. The essay tackles the differences between what is seen by the photographer and what is captured by the camera from both artistic and technical perspectives.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 2:40 AM| Comments (4)
November 17, 2006
Hedychium spicatum
Abstracted, this pair of leaves from a spiked ginger-lily reveals little about the nature of the plant on first glance. However, a closer look at the pattern of venation reveals this plant is monocotyledonous instead of dicotyledonous (having one seed-leaf as opposed to two). The parallel veins directed from the midrib (the two bold green lines in the two leaves of this photograph) outward to the leaf margin is described as peniparallel venation. For comparison's sake, the venation of grasses (another monocot) is simply termed parallel – the veins run parallel along the length of the blade (lamina) in either the presence or absence of a midrib. The presence of a type of parallel venation (including peniparallel) is a typical trait of monocots.
Hedychium spicatum is native to southeast Asia. The Flora of China has a comprehensive description of Hedychium spicatum, while its economic botany is detailed in the Plants for a Future database: Hedychium spicatum.
Environment resource link: I feel fortunate to have been able to photograph this image yesterday. Heavy rain and harsh winds have dominated the weather in British Columbia and the northwesten continental US the past few weeks. For some photographs of the extent of the damage, the US National Park Service has a few photo galleries online: Glacier National Park, Nov. 7, 2006, Glacier National Park, Nov. 8, 2006 and Mount Rainier National Park, 2006 Flood Images. On the last page, I found this image compilation in PDF to be the easiest way to view all of the images of damage in Mount Rainier NP.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:34 AM| Comments (8)
November 16, 2006
Arctostaphylos pajaroensis
A thank you to frequent BPotD contributor Eric in SF@Flickr for today's photograph (original image submitted via the BPotD Flickr Group Pool). I told myself that I needed to avoid photographs of California and its flora for at least a week or so, since I've been fairly California-centric lately – but one more won't hurt before I start that. Thanks, Eric!
California is the centre of diversity for the genus Arctostaphylos (the manzanitas or bearberries). Pajaro manzanita, unfortunately, is one of the endangered species. It is present in only two counties, Monterey and San Benito; a small population in Santa Cruz County was lost to residential development. It has been given 1B.1 Status by the California Native Plant Society, meaning it is “rare, threatened, or endangered in California and elsewhere” (1B) and seriously endangered in California (0.1). Despite that designation, it has no formal listing in either state or federal endangered species lists. This factsheet on Arctostaphylos pajaroensis from the Elkhorn Slough Coastal Training Program details the threats to the populations in Monterey County: again, residential development and associated fire suppression.
As always for Californian native plants, the Jepson Manual provides a detailed description of the taxon: Arctostaphylos pajaroensis.
Photography resource link: for inspiration, the photography of Patricia Brundage from Connecticut. Unfortunately, many of the images are on the small side.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (7)
November 15, 2006
Colletia hystrix 'Rosea'
It's been at least a month since I've shared a Lensbaby photograph, so I suppose I can sneak a couple in today.
Colletia hystrix is commonly known as crucifixion thorn or barbed wire bush. If you discount the cacti in UBC Botanical Garden, then this species competes with Erinacea anthyllis for the title of “most likely to puncture skin if handled carelessly”. Its photosynthetic thorns are viciously sharp, which, as you can see, makes it difficult to smell the small, fragrant flowers.
The species is native to Chile and Argentina. The cultivar 'Rosea' is so named because of the pink buds which gradually fade as the flower matures.
Colletia and other closely related genera in the Rhamnaceae (and the not-as-closely related Ceanothus) are actinorhizal, i.e., they have nitrogen-fixing root nodules formed in association with Actinobacteria. This phenomenon is summarized by Luis Gabriel Wall in The Actinorhizal Symbiosis - Plant Communication with Other Organisms - Chemicals are the Words from the Journal of Plant Growth Regulation in 2000 (19 (2): 167-182).
Horticulture / agriculture / history resource links: In a tangential response to this question about Eucalyptus in and around San Diego, a few interesting links were uncovered about eucalypts in California: San Diego's Eucalyptus Bubble by Leland G. Stanford in the Journal of San Diego History and The Eucalyptus of California: Seeds of Good or Seeds of Evil? by Robert L. Santos, Librarian / Archivist at California State University, Stanislaus. Thanks to Aussiebob on the UBC Forums for the second link.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:37 AM| Comments (1)
November 12, 2006
Acorus gramineus 'Minimus Aureus'
A look at the genus Acorus is a glimpse at the past. It is the sole genus within the family Acoraceae, which in turn is the only family within the order Acorales. Recent work suggests that the Acorales is the sister group to all other monocots. What does this mean? I'll borrow a passage from the Flora of North America on Acoraceae: “Evidence based on DNA sequences fails to show any close relationships between Acorus and other genera, and instead supports Acorus as the oldest extant lineage of monocotyledons (M. R. Duvall et al. 1993)”. Other orders of monocots have evolved more recently (though this is relative – the scale is in the tens of millions of years).
From a gardening perspective, Japanese or grassy-leaved sweet flag is a striking groundcover. As its cultivar name implies, this particular selection is both dwarf and golden-coloured. For more, see grassy-leaved sweet flag at the Kemper Center for Home Gardening (ignore the part about it being a member of the arum family – that's out of date) or North Carolina State University's factsheet on Acorus gramineus.
Botany / horticulture resource link: There's a new(ish) blog carnival on the topic of trees: Festival of the Trees will reach festival #6 at the beginning of December. I'll link to it again when I submit for the next festival, but in the meantime, there is plenty of Sunday reading if you follow the links to the various weblogs.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 1:39 AM| Comments (3)
November 11, 2006
Clematis 'Rooguchi'
Thank you to wermsrus-jacki@Flickr from Portland, Oregon, for sharing today's image (original image) via the BPotD Flickr Group Pool. Much appreciated!
Clematis 'Rooguchi' (sometimes misnamed 'Roguchi' or 'Rouguchi') is the result of a cross between Clematis integrifolia and Clematis reticulata (linked pages via Clematis on the Web). This deciduous lax climber is a relatively recent cultivar, having been raised in 1990 by Japanese clematis breeder, Kazuhige Ozawa. The British Clematis Society has featured it as a Clematis of the Month.
Conservation resource link: Wade Davis lectured at UBC on Wednesday, and I attended. He brought the audience's attention to the mining exploration occurring at the headwaters of the Nass, Skeena and Stikine Rivers in northern British Columbia, an area that has previously been proposed as a National Park. To get an idea of why, this National Geographic article by Davis contains a select quote: “When John Muir traveled the lower third of the Stikine in 1879, he called it a Yosemite a hundred miles (160 kilometers) long, and he counted some 300 glaciers along its tortuous course. It's a land where Canada could hide England, and the English would never find it”. Current news articles about the fight to preserve much of the area can be found on the Sacred Headwaters site: “BC natives seek to protect land, pristine rivers”, “Band finds it's not alone in fight for wilderness” and “Great-grandmother arrested for joining blockade to stop 'threat'”.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:42 AM| Comments (1)
November 10, 2006
Mammillaria compressa
The Desert Garden of Huntington Botanical Gardens (in San Marino, California) contains thousands of taxa of dryland-adapted plants. In my opinion, it is the botanical highlight of Huntington BG.
This particular “mother of hundreds” cactus is one of Huntington's oldest living accessions (assuming accession numbers are given sequentially by chronology) – accession number 948. The highest accession number I've recorded from my visit was 93643. Considering the Desert Garden was started in 1907-1908, and assuming accessions were recorded from the beginning (not a safe assumption, I've learned), it's possible that this particular plant is nearly a century old.
Mammillaria compressa is native to northeastern (subspecies centralifera) and central Mexico (subspecies compressa). Details on both of these taxa can be found on the wonderful Mammillarias.net (here and here). Both pages show the diversity of form of these subspecies through photographs.
Lastly, local readers might be interested to attend the Freeman Patterson lecture next week in Vancouver, “A Call to Creativity”. A big thank you to Jennifer (aka colour@Flickr) for pointing it out to me, as I would have missed it.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 6:41 AM| Comments (1)
November 8, 2006
Aeschynanthus speciosus
Today's photograph is contributed by van+s@Flickr (original image | BPotD Flickr Group Pool). The plant in the image was cultivated indoors at the United States Botanic Garden. Thank you for sharing, van+s!
Aeschynanthus speciosus, or lipstick plant, was previously featured as a Plant of the Week (main page) – as always, when a BPotD entry overlaps with a Plant of the Week entry, I enthusiastically recommend visiting the PotW site for more information. Tidbits gleaned from the PotW page include the distribution of this species (southeast Asia) and its ecological strategy (it's an epiphyte).
A detailed look at the genus Aeschynanthus is available on this page via the The Genera of Gesneriaceae. A more concise treatment of the genus Aeschynanthus can be found on Wikipedia (see Aeschynanthus). I was particularly interested to read the derivation of the generic name.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (3)
November 7, 2006
Pediomelum esculentum
Anne from Alberta (aka annkelliott@Flickr) submitted this mid-June photograph via the BPotD Flickr Group Pool (original image). The image was taken near Calgary, Alberta. Many thanks, Anne – it's a plant I've not seen for a long time.
When I first encountered this plant, I learned it by the scientific name Psoralea esculenta and the common name Indian breadroot. Well, the common name has remained the same, but its generally accepted scientific name has changed to Pediomelum esculentum. The change seems to be the result of this monograph: Grimes, JW. 1990. A revision of the New World Species of Psoraleeae (Leguminosae: Papilionoideae). Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 61: 1-114. (sorry, the monograph is not freely available online). Grimes' work is later reinforced by this phylogenetic analysis.
The shift from Psoralea to Pediomelum is an example of a recent trend of renaming North American genera and species (Pediomelum esculentum is native to the Prairies and US Midwest) to separate them from closely-related (but not closely enough!) European counterparts. Another example is the move of North American species of Aster into the genus Symphyotrichum (and other genera).
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (3)
November 6, 2006
Hakea laurina
There is a story behind today's photographs. Rosa, aka contemplar@Flickr sent a photograph of this plant for identification to Julie Ardery, the writer behind the Human Flower Project weblog. Julie didn't know the plant, so she posted it to the Human Flower Project: Name That Bloom, where a few of us identified it for Rosa. However, I did not realize that the Rosa who had submitted the photograph was the same as contemplar@Flickr, who you may remember has shared a few photographs with BPotD in the past. Rosa kindly submitted a few photographs (original image 1 | original image 2 | Flickr BPotD Group Pool) to BPotD so I could share the story. Thank you!
Had any of us identifying the plant been a philatelist interested in Australian stamps, it certainly would have been identified lickety-split – Hakea laurina is featured on a 2006 Australian stamp (via the ANBG). The Australian National Botanic Gardens also has an article on growing Hakea laurina.
Denis Wilson, who blogs about the Nature of Robertson in New South Wales, Australia, wrote an entry on Hakea laurina that is worth investigating. Also, do look at Heather Simkin's illustration of Hakea laurina (click on the thumbnail to enlarge) – exquisite!
Lastly, a reminder for locals: you're invited to my presentation on “Plants, Gardens and Landscapes of the Southwest USA” at noon on Tuesday in the garden's reception centre (it's free).
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 12:00 AM| Comments (3)
November 3, 2006
Ophrys tenthredinifera
Thank you to pmarquesbird@Flickr of Portugal for today's photograph. If you get a chance, browse his Flickr set of photographs – Portugal's nature, landscapes and cityscapes are all well-illustrated. Much appreciated!
The common name for this insect-mimic is sawfly orchid. Like other members of the genus Ophrys (collectively known as the “bee orchids”), its relies on fooling male insects for its pollination. The combination of pattern and pheromones from the plant mimics the look and smell of the female insect, thereby enticing the male insect to visit. While the male insect pseudocopulates, it accidentally collects pollen on its body. A subsequent visit to a different plant completes the act of cross-pollination.
Wikipedia has a great entry on Ophrys if you'd like to learn more. For photographs and a human use of sawfly orchid, visit the Herbarium at the University of Reading's page on Ophrys tenthredinifera.
Apologies for the late entry today. Access to the server was down last night and my Internet access from home failed me early this morning.
Posted by Daniel Mosquin at 8:04 AM| Comments (4)
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Botany Photo of the Day and all associated images are licensed under a Creative Commons License.
Botany Photo of the Day is a project of the UBC Botanical Garden and Centre for Plant Research, located in Vancouver, British Columbia Canada. UBC BGCPR is a department of the Faculty of Land and Food Systems within The University of British Columbia.