̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - botany

Planting ideas: Botanic Garden opens access with living collections portal

ta385 — Fri, 02 Oct 2020 07:30:00 +0000

A new web portal to Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Botanic Garden's entire living collection, 14,000 plants, aims to open access and fast-track urgent global research.

World's botanic gardens contain a third of all known plant species, and help protect the most threatened

fpjl2 — Mon, 25 Sep 2017 15:00:29 +0000

̽��ֱ��world's botanic gardens contain at least 30% of all known plant species, including 41% of all those classed as 'threatened', according to the most comprehensive analysis to date of diversity in 'ex-situ' collections: those plants conserved outside natural habitats.

̽��ֱ��study, published today in the journal Nature Plants, found that the global network of botanic gardens conserves living plants representing almost two-thirds of plant 'genera' (the classification above species) and over 90% of plant families.

However, researchers from the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge discovered a significant imbalance between temperate and tropical regions. ̽��ֱ��vast majority of all plants species grown ex-situ are held in the northern hemisphere.

Consequently, some 60% of temperate plant species were represented in botanic gardens but only 25% of tropical species, despite the fact that the majority of plant species are tropical.

For the study, researchers analysed datasets compiled by Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI). They cross-referenced the working list of known plant species – currently sitting at 350,699 – with the species records of a third of botanic gardens on the planet, some 1,116 institutions. They say this provides a "minimum estimate" for the plant diversity held in botanic gardens.

However, while gardens hold approaching half all threatened species, just 10% of overall storage capacity is dedicated to such plants. ̽��ֱ��researchers argue that botanic gardens are of "critical importance to plant conservation", and internationally coordinated efforts are needed to house even more species at risk of extinction – particularly those from tropical climates.

" ̽��ֱ��global network of botanic gardens is our best hope for saving some of the world's most endangered plants," said senior author Dr Samuel Brockington, a researcher at Cambridge's Department of Plant Sciences as well as a curator at the ̽��ֱ��'s own Botanic Garden.

"Currently, an estimated one fifth of plant diversity is under threat, yet there is no technical reason why any plant species should become extinct. Botanic gardens protect an astonishing amount of plant diversity in cultivation, but we need to respond directly to the extinction crisis.

"If we do not conserve our plant diversity, humanity will struggle to solve the global challenges of food and fuel security, environmental degradation, and climate change."

̽��ֱ��plants not currently grown in botanic gardens are often more interesting than those that are, say the researchers. Hydrostachys polymorpha, for example, an African aquatic plant that only grows in fast flowing streams and waterfalls, or the tiny parasitic plant Pilostyles thurberi – only a few millimetres long, it lives completely within the stem tissue of desert shrubs.

Species from the most ancient plant lineages, termed 'non-vascular' plants, are currently almost undocumented in botanic gardens – with as few as 5% of all species stored in the global network. These include plants such as the liverworts and mosses.

"Non-vascular species are the living representatives of the first plants to colonise the land," said Brockington. "Within these plants are captured key moments in the early evolutionary history of life on Earth, and they are essential for understanding the evolution of plants."

From the spectacular new Gardens by the Bay in Singapore to London's own legendary Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, the world's botanic gardens collectively host 500 million visitors a year.

"As a professional community, botanic gardens conserve and manage a far greater array of plant diversity than any other sector. However, we still have much to do." said Dr Paul Smith, study co-author and Secretary General of BGCI.

"This study is extremely important because it will enable us to target our efforts much more effectively, and work together to ensure that plant species don't needlessly become extinct," Smith said.

̽��ֱ��most in-depth species survey to date finds an “astonishing array” of plant diversity in the global botanic garden network, including 41% of all endangered species. However, researchers find a significant imbalance between tropical and temperate plants, and say even more capacity should be given to conservation, as there is “no technical reason for plant species to become extinct”.

̽��ֱ��global network of botanic gardens is our best hope for saving some of the world's most endangered plants

Samuel Brockington

CUBG

Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Botanic Garden (CUBG)

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Opinion: ̽��ֱ��flower breeders who sold X-ray lilies and atomic marigolds

Anonymous — Tue, 24 May 2016 09:35:24 +0000

̽��ֱ��Chelsea Flower Show, one of the biggest and best known horticultural shows in the world, is now open. In the coming days, some 150,000 visitors will make their way to the Royal Hospital Chelsea, expecting to be wowed by innovative garden designs and especially by gorgeous flowers. Among other things, show-goers will have a chance to learn the winner of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Plant of the Year award. This annual prize goes to the “most inspiring new plant” on display at the show – a high honour indeed given the number and range of varieties introduced each year.

̽��ֱ��relentless pursuit of showy flowers for garden display extends back significantly further than the 104 years of the Chelsea show. One need only recall the infamous Dutch tulip craze of the 17th century to be reminded that fascination with floral novelties has a long and storied history.

Over the centuries, entrepreneurial cultivators have endeavoured to create unique plant varieties, either by bringing together the genetic material from established lines through hybridisation or through the discovery of new genetic variation such as a chance mutation in a field. Today, flower breeding is pursued with a far better understanding of plant biology than ever before, in some cases with the aid of technologies such as tissue culture and genetic transformation. Yet the goal remains the same: the creation of tantalising tulips, ravishing roses, show-stopping snapdragons and myriad other plants that will ideally prove irresistible to gardeners and turn a handsome profit.

̽��ֱ��quest to produce profitable new varieties – and to do so as fast as possible – at times led to breeders to embrace methods that today seem strange. There is no better illustration of this than the mid-century output of one of America’s largest flower-and-vegetable-seed companies, W Atlee Burpee & Co.

Gardening with X-rays

In 1941, Burpee Seed introduced a pair of calendula flowers called the “X-Ray Twins”. ̽��ֱ��company president, David Burpee, claimed that these had their origins in a batch of seeds exposed to X-rays in 1933 and that the radiation had generated mutant types, from which the “X-Ray Twins” were eventually developed.

At the time, Burpee was not alone in exploring whether X-rays might facilitate flower breeding. Geneticists had only recently come to agree that radiation could lead to genetic mutation: the possibilities for creating variation “on demand” now seemed boundless. Some breeders even hoped that X-ray technologies would help them press beyond existing biological limits.

̽��ֱ��Czech-born horticulturist Frank Reinelt thought that subjecting bulbs to radiation might help him produce an elusive red delphinium. Unfortunately, the experiment did not produce the hoped-for hue. Greater success was achieved by two engineers at the General Electric Research Laboratory, who produced – and patented – a new variety of lily as a result of their experiments in X-ray breeding.

Though Reinelt’s and other breeders' tangles with X-ray technology resulted in woefully few marketable plant varieties, David Burpee remained keen on testing new techniques as they appeared on the horizon. He was especially excited about methods that, like X-ray irradiation, promised to generate manifold genetic mutations. He thought these would transform plant breeding by making new inheritable traits – the essential foundation of a novel flower variety – available on demand. He estimated that “in his father’s time” a breeder chanced on a mutation “once in every 900,000 plants”. He and his breeders, by comparison, equipped with X-rays, UV-radiation, chemicals, and other mutation-inducing methods, could "turn them out once in every 900 plants. Or oftener”.

Scientific sales pitches

A 1973 Burpee cover. Burpee, CC BY-NC-ND

Burpee’s numbers were hot air, but in a few cases plant varieties produced through such methods did prove hot sellers. In the late 1930s Burpee breeders began experimentation with a plant alkaloid called colchicine, a compound that sometimes has the effect of doubling the number of chromosomes in a plant’s cells. They exploited the technique to create new varieties of popular garden flowers such as marigold, phlox, zinnia, and snapdragons.

All were advertised as larger and hardier as a result of their chromosome reconfiguration – and celebrated by the company as the products of “chemically accelerated evolution”. ̽��ֱ��technique proved particularly successful with snapdragons, giving rise to a line of "Tetra Snaps” that were by the mid-1950s the best-selling varieties of that flower in the United States.

Burpee’s fascination with (in his words) “shocking mother nature” to create novel flowers for American gardeners eventually led him to explore still more potent techniques for generating inheritable variation. He even had some of the company’s flower beds seeded with radioactive phosphorus in the 1950s. These efforts do not appear to have led to any new varieties – Burpee Seed never hawked an “atomic-bred” flower – but the firm’s experimentation with radiation did result in a new Burpee product. Beginning in 1962, they offered for sale packages of “atomic-treated” marigold seeds, from which home growers might expect to grow a rare white marigold among other oddities.

Burpee was, above all, a consummate showman and a master salesman. His enthusiasm for the use of X-rays, chemicals, and radioisotopes in flower breeding emerged as much from his knowledge that these methods could be effectively incorporated into sales pitches as from his interest in more efficient and effective breeding. Many of his mid-century consumers wanted to see the latest science and technology at work in their gardens, whether in the form of plant hormones, chemical treatments, or varieties produced through startling new techniques.

Times have changed, 60-odd years later. Chemicals and radiation are as more often cast as threatening than benign, and it is likely that many of today’s visitors to the Chelsea Flower Show hold a different view about the kinds of breeding methods they’d like to see employed on their garden flowers. But as the continued popularity of the show attests, their celebration of flower innovations and the human ingenuity behind these continues, unabated.

Helen Anne Curry, Peter Lipton Lecturer in History of Modern Science and Technology, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

This article was originally published on ̽��ֱ��Conversation. Read the original article.

̽��ֱ��opinions expressed in this article are those of the individual author(s) and do not represent the views of the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

Helen Anne Curry (Department of History and Philosophy of Science) discusses the history of our fascination with floral novelties.

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'Besom ling and teasel burrs': John Clare and botanising

amb206 — Sat, 20 Sep 2014 08:09:00 +0000

,In his early years, the poet John Clare worked as a gardener at Burghley House, a Tudor mansion just outside Stamford. Later, he struck up a close friendship with Joseph Henderson, an enthusiastic naturalist and head gardener at Milton Hall, an imposing house set in acres of lush parkland to the north of Peterborough. ̽��ֱ��letters sent between Clare and Henderson reveal their exchange of expertise, and also their shared interest in expanding their botanical knowledge through the pages of the numerous botanical volumes in the Milton Hall library.

In letters and manuscripts now housed in libraries in Peterborough and Northampton, Clare describes his efforts to grow in his own cottage garden some of the species he has encountered at Burghley and Milton. October 1824 finds him working ‘in the garden at making a shed for my ariculas’. Later, in one of many lists, he records the names of the auriculas he admires but is unable to afford. In November 1824 he notes that he has ‘received a parcel of Ferns & flowers from Henderson the common Polipody…the harts tongue… the Lady fern… tall white Lychnis with seven new sorts of Chrysanthemums…”.

Clare’s deep interest in plants, his love of 'botanising' and the significance of plants in his writing, is the focus of a symposium taking place next week at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Botanic Garden. ̽��ֱ��meeting will bring together botanists, nature writers, artists and literary scholars to look afresh at the poet’s relationship with the environment. It has been organised by the Centre for John Clare Studies in the Faculty of English, set up earlier this year by Dr Paul Chirico (Senior Tutor at Fitzwilliam College), Dr Mina Gorji and Dr Sarah Houghton-Walker, to mark the 150^th anniversary of Clare’s death.

It was at Northampton General Lunatic Asylum that Clare died, aged 70, on 20 May 1864. His gravestone in Helpston churchyard remembers him as ‘ ̽��ֱ��Northamptonshire Peasant Poet’ and each summer children from the primary school that bears his name lay flowers on his resting place, in the form of Midsummer Cushions - a tradition dating back to Clare’s day of making cushions of turf studded with meadow flowers.

̽��ֱ��term ‘Peasant Poet’, with its implications of lack of education, is a label that belies Clare’s intellect as someone hungry for knowledge and quick to learn. As the son of a poor farm labourer, his formal education was at best sporadic and confined to village ‘vestry’ and ‘dame’s schools’; he left school early to take a job to help support his family.

Clare read widely and engaged as much as he was able with contemporary debates on everything from politics to art theory, from religion to natural history. He tutored himself in mathematics and read a wide range of poetry, prose and drama. Many of his books are now housed in their original wooden bookcase in Northampton Public Library.

Houghton-Walker said: “We hope that next week’s symposium will encourage a conversation about Clare’s intense curiosity regarding the plants he observed in field and garden, and his desire to understand and catalogue them according to the latest scientific methods. He made close observations of plant habitats, recording how different species related to one other, and he collected many botanical specimens. His poems bear witness to his minute observations of flora.”

It is evident, however, that Clare struggled with the Linnaean system and its reliance on hard-to-pronounce Latin nomenclature. In his journal for October 1824, he records a plan to collect a book and ‘call it 'A Garden of Wild Flowers', as it shall contain nothing else with quotations from poets & others an English Botany on this plan would be very interesting & serve to make Botany popular while the hard nicknaming system of unutterable words now in vogue only overloads it in mystery till it makes it darkness visible’.

Clare enjoyed brief spells of acclaim during his lifetime and gained the support of a number of benefactors. But for many years his poetry lapsed into obscurity. It was only in the early 20th century that writers and editors such as Arthur Symons and Edward Thomas brought his work once again to public attention. Since then, he has been championed by poets such as Ted Hughes, John Ashbery, Elaine Feinstein, Seamus Heaney and Tom Paulin. Today Clare’s close engagement with the natural world chimes with a resurgence of interest in nature writing.

̽��ֱ��poet's celebration of flora and fauna is often discussed in terms of his love of wilderness and his resistance to the enclosure movement and resulting changes in farming practices that were threatening to destroy the countryside he knew ‘with its besom ling and teasel burrs’. Eager to record and preserve, in writing, the environment he felt was under threat, he set himself the task of documenting the natural world around his village in Northamptonshire. In 1824 he began to write down his observations in a group of letters which have come to be known as an unfinished Natural History of Helpston. Despite the increasing popularity of Clare’s poetry, these were not published until 1983.

̽��ֱ��guest speakers invited to address the symposium reflect its aim to mesh together poetry and botany. They include Professor John Parker, former director of the Botanic Garden, as well as its current director, Professor Beverley Glover, who will lead a tour of the Garden’s systematic beds.

Professor Fiona Stafford from Oxford ̽��ֱ��, an expert on literature and landscape, will talk about ‘Clare and the Splendid Sycamore’. Stafford has delivered two series on ' ̽��ֱ��Meaning of Trees' for Radio 3. She said: “Clare's wonderful sonnet on ' ̽��ֱ��Sycamore' is based on first hand observation of a tree that has often been overlooked, and even condemned, for being common and invasive. Clare's great gift is to see glory in the commonplace - and, in doing so, open the eyes of readers to things so familiar as to be virtually invisible.”

As well as demonstrating his understanding of the interconnectedness of the environment, Clare’s poems reveal that his interest in botanical classification registered and responded to his own feelings about social class. He was born into poverty, one of a pair of twins, the only one to survive, and his tiny frame may have been a result of malnutrition. Like his father, he began work as a farm labourer while still a boy. Beset by terrible depression, he struggled to make ends meet all his life and, as a working class poet, formed relationships with people from different social strata but never felt entirely accepted by them.

Dr Sue Edney from Bath Spa ̽��ֱ�� will look at the ways in which botanical classification is in itself class-based and how plants in their ‘place’ become caught up in this process of identification and division through naming. She said: “Clare’s mingling of Latin names with common English names, of Linnaean systems with ‘natural’ ones, is related to his self-positioning as a natural poet – a poet related to his place – combined with his desire to become an establishment writer.”

̽��ֱ��writer Richard Mabey made his name in the early 1970s with his seminal book Food for Free and has since written extensively on people, plants and the things that bind them together. His 2007 book Nature Cure charts his experience of breakdown and recovery – and the role of nature as healer. As a Visiting Fellow at Emmanuel College, where he is working on a book due out next year, he will talk about ‘Clare and the plant’s point of view’, exploring Clare’s distinctive ability to put himself in the position of his poetic subjects – in this case, the plants he loved and wrote about.

Hetty Saunders is just embarking on an MPhil at Wolfson College, Cambridge, where she will be writing a dissertation on Clare and botany. In looking at the complex relationship that Clare created between plants, landscapes and texts, she will discuss the way that Clare often related his writing to plants of the field, and vice versa, as in this quote from his poem ‘Remembrances’: ‘… my poesys all cropt in a sunny hour/As keepsakes and pledges all to never fade away’.

Among the participants at the symposium will be two artists, Anita Bruce and Kathryn Parsons, members of the five-strong UnEarthed collective who have been resident artists this year at Clare Cottage, Helpston. Kathryn Parson’s ‘I Found the Poems in the Fields’ renders Clare’s intimate observations of nature in delicate hand-modelled porcelain. Her creations tell of the layered platelets of lichen colonies from Royce Wood and Lolham Bridges, and the bold architectural plants found at Swaddywell, all sites known and written about by Clare.

John Clare's Cottage was renovated and established as an educational centre in 2009 by the John Clare Trust, of which Paul Chirico is vice-chair. ̽��ֱ��cottage has a garden designed by Adam Frost which won a gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2012. ̽��ֱ��landscapes around the village, though much affected by agricultural and social changes since Clare’s birth in 1793, still include many of the features that he loved to visit and described so precisely.

̽��ֱ��symposium ‘John Clare and Botany’ will take place at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge Botanic Garden on 23 September. ̽��ֱ��event is fully booked.

Inset images: John Clare as a young man (Creative Commons); inscription from Clare's grave in Helpston (Geoff Shipp); sycamore tree (Creative Commons); John Clare's cottage garden with porcelain installations by Kathryn Parsons (UnEarthed)

A symposium taking place on Tuesday (23 September 2014) at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Botanic Garden will unite artists, writers, scientists and literary scholars to look at the poet John Clare’s close engagement with the natural environment as a botanist as well as poet.

Clare’s mingling of Latin names with common English names, of Linnaean systems with ‘natural’ ones, is related to his self-positioning as a natural poet – a poet related to his place – combined with his desire to become an establishment writer.

Sue Edney, Bath Spa ̽��ֱ��

Anita Bruce (UnEarthed)

Swaddywell Pit near Helpston, Northants

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