Spring into action with Plantlife: Spring into action with Plantlife with Sarah Shuttleworth

The aims of this webinar:

• Learn the basic parts of a plant
• Be able to recognise these parts in some flowers
• Provide a strong foundation for learning more about plant identification

Why do we need to learn this?

• Terminology can be intimidating
• Foundation of knowledge to go further
• Transferrable skills for learning about other aspects of nature

To begin with, we looked at the anatomy of a generalised flower. Here's a diagram I crew a few years ago:

The base of the flower is the receptacle, between the end of the flower stalk and before the flower organs. The T-shape at the base of the diagram is the receptacle.

Sepals are the whorl of outermost flower organs, their role is to protect the flower when it is bud. A group of sepals are called a calyx. Sepals can be free, fused together as a calyx/calyx tube (eg. Ragged Robin), or partly fused (eg. Bell flower).

Petals are the second whorl of floral organs. As a group, known as the corolla, consisting of free petals (eg. cranesbills), or a joined tube (eg. harebell). Petals can be whole or various depths of notched petals.

Another old diagram, this time focussing
 on petal and sepal terminology.

Pistil consists of the ovary, style and stigma, also known as a carpel. Where a pistil and carpel differ is when there is internal division with multiple carpels within a single pistil, this can be seen when multiple styles and stigmas are showing from a single ovary, such as in members of the carrot family.

The ovary can be either superior, above the other flower parts, or inferior, underneath the flower parts. There is also an intermediate version going by the name of semi-inferior. My diagram shows a superior ovary. The ovary is the ovule-bearing (immature seed bearing) organ. The ovary may contain many ovules.

The stigma, which can vary massively from feathered to multiple prongs, such as trident structures, is the receptive tip of a carpel, or of several fused carpels.

The style is the structure that supports the stigma and provides a route for the pollen tube to develop after pollination. Styles can be very long, pushing the stigma outside of the whorls, or very short.

Stamen consists of a filament (stalk), with anthers at the end. The filament pushes the anthers out into the world, making the pollen-filled anthers available.

Looking at the wider plant, there are leaves (or blades), stems that have nodes (such as leaves) and internodes, the parts in-between.

If a leaf is not fixed to the stem, it will have a structure called a petiole in-between the stem and leaf. Some plant have stipules at the base of the petiole, which can sometimes be used for species identification.

Sarah's teaching style is fantastic, comprehensive, and yet easy going. Her homemade giant flower was a great learning aid. The presentation had two quizzes, which were useful for recalling the terms given. 

Much advice was given about progressing with studies, with some books and apps recommended. 

This webinar can be viewed here:

The follow up webinar can be joined here: An introduction to plant identification: 5 families (tixoom.app)