Welcome to Berry Go Round, a new plant’s carnival. This is the first edition, so I took the freedom to prospect and feed it with posts from the last two months (a few unsolicited articles found their way into the present edition as well). Since plant blogging is growing fast these weeks, I think BGR will have enough to enroot into the blogosphere, stem from blogs around, yield lots of flowers and be fruitful.
But let’s see what plantee grades have to offer right now:
There’s a new palm species tree, Tahina spectabilis, which has been inspiring a lot of us. Given its size, and judging from its wonderful inflorescence, this comes as no surprise. While the Ethical Paleontologist so rightly nominated it as a cool organism, even if it might prove difficult to have it fitting into a mesozoic garden, you may reach further details about systematic arguments around this so poetic name at Further Thoughts. Finally, Human Flower Project was inspired comparing plant diversity to human diversity. But let ponder this finding with another cool palm species post from Talking Plants (and since palms have such a success in this edition, I can’t resist recycling this older post about a very cool pollinating mutualism within this amazing group). As a transition, Tai Haiku is offering us a pictural post about those ‘oldies’, modern species that survived the fall of these great basal groups of plants… (Tree sign illustrated is courtesy of C. Purrington, Hat tip from Evolving Thoughts).
Mosses had their share of existence in the blogosphere these weeks. Some species do make a winter cold meiosis. But you still need some light to have them grow, as is explained at Moss Plants And More, and when it has everything needed (like in a tropical green paradise), it will readily grow on leaves. But let’s not forget about other wonder plants like ferns or horsetails… You may not be obcessed about fern gametophytes, but here it is made sexy, and with cool pictures (part 1, part 2). Going our way, it strikes me as a recent scientific litterature habit to oppose in natura and in silico. At Gravity’s Rainbow, you’ll fuse both and learn about some natural silica from horsetails.
At Art Plantae Today, you’ll discover how gathering botanical information may sometimes lead you to terrible choices. Be sure to carefully select and cross your sources… At A Neotropical Savanna , you’ll enjoy two different and exotic topics. First, about a Eupatorium and the joys of getting botany right (picture next right courtesy of A Neotropical Savanna). For sure, 21st and 20ieth cent. botanists will soon speak completely different languages… Second, a look into economic and sustainable property delineation, with a strange and fascinating living fence. Applied botany has many fascinating flavours… Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog explores the potential adoption of golden crops, biofortification seeds to cure vitamin A deficiency. The thing is that there are often food cultural preferences detering the golden approach… But if golden is not gold, why turn its back on local greens?
On another subject, Invasive Species reminds us that “eradicated” invasives, such as the Gray Mangroves (Avicennia marina) may also come back. A plant’s disappearance sometimes takes more than a mere apparent absence… While this is hopefully true when it comes to rare endangered species, this also means monitoring invasives may involve long term management of rescued areas… Ontogeny had a somewhat big list of invasive species, among which many plants, if you care to have an idea as to what this means…
Going back to cool plants, Catalogue of Organisms celebrated Cotoneaster bushes blues, and the taxonomical consequences of their hesitation between sex and apomixy. Well, in this taxon, lumpers won a systematic struggle, based on practical grounds, unless the actual reason is that not enough people were interested in classifying this genus in the past? And speaking of plant sexuality, Behavioral Ecology Blog has a post on Agave gentryi, a species decided to play the mating game, only once every 60 years though… And it just happened recently.
In an earlier post, Talking Plants dived into research on orchids, and tells us about a wonderfull Platanthera species. Given the popularity of orchids, I’d bet without hesitation they’ll have their glory times in a coming Berry Go Round, especially since from now on you can offer them in a bottle (please drink responsibly). But since we’re going more into technology right here, we can read about the publication of yet another plant genome: the soybean (Glycine max) at Sandwalk, or have a look on algae power as well, at BLDGBLOG…
The best picture of the month is to be seen at Botany Photo of the Day. Finally, the edition ends up with a warm but cool kitchen post. Fat-Free Vegan Kitchen gives us the recipe to roast pecans, though this might drive some nuts…
The next edition of Berry Go Round will be hosted at Further Thoughts… Don’t forget to send submissions before February, the 25th.
Special thanks to Further Thoughts for actively promoting this first edition of Berry Go Round. Many thanks to bloggers that helped requesting submissions for this new carnival: Catalogue of Organisms, A Blog Around The Clock, Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog, Greg Laden, Laelaps.
[…] January 27, 2008 by Ian The first edition of the botanical blog carnival Berry Go Round is up at Seeds Aside. Go check it […]
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[…] I also want to take this opportunity to welcome the brand-new blog carnival Berry Go-Round, which is devoted to plant life of all kinds. The first edition has just appeared. […]
[…] Be sure to check out the short-but-diverse Festival of the Trees #20. And if you any broader interest in plants, you may be interested to learn that there’s a brand-new blog carnival for plants called Berry Go Round. The first edition is up at Seeds Aside. […]
[…] plant blogger from Seeds Aside has organized a “carnival” of plant blogs called Berry Go Round. The carnival presents a great deal of interesting information on plants all at once. The host does […]
Great blog…
Excellent site, keep up the good work
[…] on September 6, 2010 by Mary In January 2008, Laurent Penet launched the blogosphere’s first carnival devoted to plants. He called it Berry Go Round and pointed to 26 posts about some aspect of botany. The carnival has […]
[…] over at Seeds Aside. For some fun and inspiration, have a look at some of the other BGRs hosted at Seeds […]