It is now December and with many plants dead or heading to dormancy, it is a month of eXtreme botany for sure! Interested to see what younger botanical eyes might make of this season, Dr M passed his camera to his 10 year old niece on Sunday afternoon
Two of Dr M’s students, Christine and Waheed, came up with a devilishly eXtreme botanical challenge to test different aspects of the botanists’ ID skills at the BSBI Annual Exhibition Meeting on Saturday 23rd November at the Natural History Museum, London!
“Botany is just the best “B” word we have“, Dr M tells the delegates at the BSBI Annual Exhibition Meeting at the Natural History Museum, 23rd November 2013.
Even if you were present at Dr M’s presentation at the afternoon talks of the BSBI Annual Exhibition Meeting on Saturday 23rd November you will have missed Dr M’s presentation!
Yes, Dr M headed into London Town for the Annual Exhibition Meeting of the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland on Saturday 23rd November at the Natural History Museum. Dr M was there with his eXtreme botany manifesto, and with some of his current students who prepared an eXtreme botanical challenge for the delegates!
Dr M has a dream: The University of Reading has just launched a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) in plant identification and field botany…
OK, so you find this plant on abandoned railway sidings in West London. It looks like Ragwort (Senecio jacobaea) but the leaves are all wrong, they are very thin, even grass-like, alternate and clasping the stem. The flower books are not a lot of help and none of the illustrations looks anything like it.
Leaves are turning beautiful shades of yellow, orange, red and brown and are falling from the trees – aided and abetted by the winds, there can be no denying autumn is here!
Did you have a go at Dr M’s Common Grass Quiz from the University of Reading Harris Garden? If not try it out here and come back to check the answers below. Below are the images of the twelve grass species with common names (click the images for Latin names). Dr M says: how did you do? Even if you are not yet a grass champion maybe this little
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