2012 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 21,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 5 Film Festivals

Click here to see the complete report.

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August Berry Go Round

Previous installment of Berry Go Round was over there at The Daily Plant. Now we are at summer’s heart, when plants experience mostly drought (well, at least in temperate climates! Oh, and that’s also harvest time peak for many vegs), though the plant blogosphere’s been nothing like dry, quite the contrary… Let’s discover plenty of planty stuff!

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Greening cities

It’s been already pointed out in here about green plant layered walls and how it gives a very interesting look to classical architecture. (e.g.). Last Octobre, while walking with a friend visiting France (too shortly), we found this by chance (random walks are sometimes quite fruitful):

-This is the vertical garden from Quai Branly, and the wall builds up onto the Museum building- It is really fantastic…

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Amazon

So I left you long enough with such an unsubtle question, where am I? Of course I decided to go to the place every plant biologist wish to visit in his/her/its life, Amazonia. Note that I guess many other biologist kinds and non-biologists would have a little kid’s dream like this one.

When I eventually realised being a biologist is different from having an academic position, or a position in society at all, and since part of my family in law is here and there for some time now, I decided I better have to go. Some grow up, some go in.

After the fold, a few pix to describe a more precise area, since Amazonia exist only on a map, and we should probably better pluralise the place to better reflect changes in substance occuring between natural areas. But here it is.

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Pollinated by…

Crithmum maritimum
Originally uploaded by Fergal OP

Just another pollination game.

This plant is Crithmum maritimum (Asteraceae), and grows in rocky shores. In most places it is pollinated by flies and bees, like any respected member of the family (botanical of course). In some place it is pollinated by an unexpected creature. Would you guess which one?

(Answer next month, after BGR has gone :)

More pixes of the species here.

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Berry Go Round…s

So I disappeared from the blogosphere a few days weeks months, and I didn’t advertised some very good Berry Go Round Carnivals. You can find the very latest installation (#35, a special number :) just there at An Accidental Botanist. Since the last time I hosted my prefered carnival (oh no, there are some other very good science carnival around :), you may have missed those at A Blog Around the Clock,  10,000 Birds, and Watching the World Wake Up (well, actually, you shouldn’t of course, since there’s a very blog to remind you about plants around blogs themselves : ).

Since I’m writing about BGR, I’m happy to tell you that I’m trying to come back, and to make sure it won’t just be whispers, I’ll host the next edition, due next January. But before that, here is a BGR festlink . I have to confess I just copied and pasted from a very good site, but nevermind… So here are the historical berries:

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Name that strain (train ‘that’ names)

So…

… Here is a potato emerging from the Lasagnas, early in May. It has a very sweet purple robe. The stem keeps this redish brown colour when the plant grows.

The leaves actually turn green, though paler than classical potato varieties.

Could you guess which variety this plant belongs to?

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The key is under the roof. Or more.

Dear friends… Life is as it is. There’s always a period sometimes anytime. I guess this is probably what happens here. I’ve enjoyed blogging, I still like it. I think I don’t have time for it, but now there’s more. I didn’t realise, really, that my ultimate reader model was dad. Yep, this is really “Biology for my dad” Blog. A month ago, dad untimely left us to nowhere forever. I can’t find nor do I want nobody to write for anymore, or the time I’ll do Seeds Aside may make no sense to me anymore anyway. I know plants can revive even after a long disappearance. I can’t say whether this will be so and I don’t care. So, sorry, this was probably the last post in here.

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Luna moth ticks

Actias-luna_2007-05-31-084630

Just found an article discussing successful hybridization between Actias luna and the dramatically endangered European Graellsia isabelae. Follow the link (warning: it’s a pdf, I assume you have a working version of Acrobat) to have a look at the pictures… (it’s in French, only fluents can read sorry, but the pictures are great anyway)(. And it’s actually somewhat old so I presume you already knew it).

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BGR #24

Is at Phytophactor… Just there. Go read plants!

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