Dr M was in Dorset recently and took the opportunity to visit one of the largest and most complex of Iron Age hillforts in Europe, Maiden Castle, whose huge multiple ramparts once protected several hundred residents. It’s an old, old site and excavations famously carried out in the 1930s and 1980s revealed the site’s 4,000-year history, from a Neolithic causewayed enclosure to a small Roman
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Dr M is always delighted when his students move on from University of Reading to push botanical boundaries forward in their careers, and Charlie Campbell is one such, one of Dr M’s recent MSc Plant Diversity students and now a PhD student and deep Sphagnophile to boot! Charlie is already known to DrMGoesWild, previously seen discussing, you guessed it, Sphagnum (check his previous Sphagnum post here). But now
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Dr M says: It’s that time of year again! Last year’s University of Reading MSc Plant Diversity students (class of 2014 pictured above) are just about finishing their dissertations and ready to move on to botanical pastures new, while the class of 2015 are soon to be on their way to Reading for a new exciting and, if Dr M has anything to do with
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Botanical theme parks don’t come along every day and so the Eden project has carved a special niche for plant lovers everywhere. Without plants our world is no world and there are few better place to see this message in action than at Eden.

Dr M’s mini-quiz #5 was about the plants used by a spider to support her web? Here they are again: Well the family of the upright monocot (left) was pretty obvious, Juncaceae and the genus Juncus, but which species? You might have wondered Juncus effusus (Soft Rush) but that species has either a lax or compact inflorescence, whilst the plant here has an interrupted
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…said the spider to the … spider! And so to celebrate national insect week (ye\h Dr M knows spiders are Arachnids not Insects but…!) Dr M offers these images of a female spider and her husband (aka lunch) on their web abode outside Dr M’s parlour (aka kitchen!) recently. Dr M is particularly fond of spiders, but, however lovely they might be, Arachnida hardly
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For the love of seeds how did you do?! Well, there were three obvious families clinging to Dr M’s eXtreme botany boots, and one less obvious and no doubt others lurking in nooks, crannies and crevices as they do!

Dr M has been enjoying a recent burst of virtual botanical activity on Twitter stimulated by Dr Chris Martine launching the hashtag #iamabotanist which has seen a great response from botanists and non-botanists and spouses and so on all proudly posting pictures and telling the Twitter world who and where they are and what they are up to (botanically speaking!). There has been a tiny
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One of the mysteries of plant ecology is exactly how plants disperse and colonise new areas of land. Now, thanks to Dr M, we can consider this puzzle solved, it’s obvious, they hitch a ride on Dr M’s fieldwork boots! Dr M is particularly fond of seeds, such beautiful, extraordinary and powerful botanical objects. Dr M has posted about seeds before (e.g. here) but
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Just as #iamabotanist gets trending on Twitter Dr M’s series of botanical selfies continues with self-confessed non-botanist (!) but definite plantophile, Dr Sophie Williams one of the team developing the new MSc in Plant Conservation at Bangor. Anyone who works so closely with people and plants IS a botanist in Dr M’s eyes and there is much to love in this account, and for Dr M two
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