Curator’s live tour 1/7/20

Here is the latest live tour in the Garden which took place on 1st July; Nick discusses pollination including the evolutionary adaptations of flower colour and shape, the native grassland and the importance of knapweed and yellow rattle, and the plants of the Mediterranean Maquis.

We apologise for the low sound quality in this video, but there should be enough to enjoy the tour!

Nature repeating itself

By Andy Winfield

It was Georgia O’Keefe who said, ‘When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment’. It’s worth doing this, nature is captivating close up; perfectly packaged and clinically efficient, each flower has an adapted shape and look gleaned over hundreds of thousands of years for maximum productivity. This economy of engineering uses patterns and shapes that are repeated again and again throughout the natural world and dotted all around the Botanic Garden. (more…)

Tea, thatch and early spring

Crocus appearing in the Garden.

By Andy Winfield

Today as I write this the sun is shining, the birds are in full voice singing, cawing and screeching around the Garden. Bulbs are popping up, crocus are the first with daffodils a week away from carpeting the ground with yellow. Primroses are dotting grassy areas and bees are beginning to forage in the middle of the day; the minimum temperature that a bee can fly is said to be 13 degrees, so when you see one out and about you know the season is changing. (more…)

Keeping your head above water: plants coping with waterlogging

By Helen Roberts

 

Flooding on the Somerset Levels.
Photo credit: Nigel Mykura [CC BY-SA 2.0],
via Wikimedia Commons

Britain has had its fair share of flooding over the last couple of years. In 2014, the Somerset Levels was under water for weeks and 2015 saw some truly devastating flooding occurring in the northwest of England. Flooding can have detrimental effects on our own lives, but also on plant communities. (more…)