Dr M’s mini-quiz from Maiden Castle: the answers part 1…
It’s one thing to rampage the ramparts and scale the slopes of Maiden Castle, but have you survived Dr M’s chalk grassland mini-quiz?
Dr M says “hello and goodbye” to MSc Plant Diversity students…
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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Dr M’s mini-quiz answer #3: the mystery wet weekend plant!
OK, the soggy Bank Holiday Monday is over and now we are into a soggy week at work! You’ve had plenty of sodden hours to contemplate this plant so here’s the low down: The mystery plant is in the family Amaranthaceae which includes three genera. (1) Chenopodium which is a genus of annual herbs with grooved, often striped stems and leaves which are often mealy
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Dr M’s botanical mini-quiz #3: something for a wet Bank Holiday Monday!
OK it’s a wet soggy Bank Holiday Monday (as usual!) so why not dry yourself off and warm yourself up with Dr M’s mystery plant mini-quiz #3! This is a plant doing rather well in Dr M’s Mum’s garden in the Wye Valley near Chepstow at the moment. Can you get family? genus? species? Close-up image coming a bit later!
Dr M’s weekend botany mini-quiz #2: a plant which breaks the rules!
OK it’s nearly the weekend, so to get you in the mini-holiday spirit here is #2 in Dr M’s new botanical mini-quiz series: a plant which breaks the rules! Dr M likes nothing more than a plant which breaks the rules because plants which don’t quite do what we expect challenge us and teach us lots about the importance of things like variation and plasticity in
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Dr M’s MalHam diary #3
eXtreme botany heads North to Malham Tarn Field Studies Centre with Dr M and University of Reading Plant Diversity MSc students, this is #3 of Dr M’s MalHam Diary. Day 3 Monday: which was a day of species-rich vegetation in calcicolous grassland and calcicolous fun in the Ha Ha Fen! The group walked from the FSC centre down the hill to the calcicolous grassland overlooking Malham Tarn looking at its
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Dr M takes a big pea on the roadside…
This rather magnificent member of the Pea family – Fabaceae – is very conspicuous on roadsides and waste ground around Reading and much further afield at the moment.
eXtreme botany at the edge – saltmarsh vegetation
Dr M was surveying coastal vegetation recently on the Isle of Grain in Kent and he came across a small semi-circular beach and this set him thinking about (and photographing) saltmarsh vegetation. Most plants on earth are terrestrial and cannot tolerate seawater which has a devastating effect on the osmotic potential and water relations of most land plants, literally sucking the water and life out
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To be Cotoneaster or not Cotoneaster? That is the question…?
Cotoneaster is a diverse genus of shrubs and small trees in the family Rosaceae and much beloved of gardeners (but less so by British conservationists see below!).
Dr M’s field day diary #3 – eXtreme botany in the water!
This week Dr M has been taking his MSc students on a series of field days, visiting a range of sites and habitats. Here is the third post from Dr M’s field day diary: Day 3: Botany at historical Runnymede