The Iris family or Iridaceae, according to Stace has 15 genera but several genera are clearly escaped garden plants and not yet widely spread in the wild so will mainly mention the real natives and/or the more common introduced ones which are also described in the Wildflower Key.
They are more difficult to identify without flower as of course all have similar, strap-like leaves in various shades of green!
I use colour coding for easy reading! Blue background is general interesting info (although I hope you find it all interesting!!). Green is about all the uses except for medicinal uses or if there is a warning in which case I use a pink background. Pictures by Matt Summers (MS), Mike Poulton (MP) of Ecorecord and Wikipedia Commons
Please use Jump-links in contents to easily get to the various species on next page!
In Part 3, I will write about the pink and/or white flowered Crucifers which inhabit these Isles.
I follow the order of The Wild Flower Key as this has useful pictures which make identifying this somewhat unfamiliar and confusing family a lot easier!
I use the Online Atlas of the British and Irish Flora link on the First, italic, scientific names, so you can find out where it is likely to be found growing in the wild. You can also find other useful information here, especially its growing habitat and conditions!
On the Common Name link you can also find more information as well as useful pictures. Pictures in this post are by Matt Summers, Mike Poulton and sourced through Wikipedia Common with thanks.
Please use Jump-links in contents to read more about the individual genera & species on the next page!
Below a table of all the Native Plant Families I hope to write about in the coming future and links on all those families already covered. This will also be displayed on one of my pages, as it gets easily lost in between my posts!
The reasons for doing my blog is also best explained in these earlier posts:
In this post some more useful members of the Brassica or Crucifer family. It covers most of the yellow flowered ones!
In Part 3, I will write about the pink and/or white flowered Crucifers which inhabit these Isles.
And these are the plants I covered earlier in Part 1- just to give a small variety of useful Crucifers!
Erophila verna or Common Whitlowgrass
Cardamine pratensis or Cuckoo Flower, Lady’s Smock
Capsella bursa-pastoris or Shepard’s purse
Arabidopsis thaliana or Thale Cress
Cochlearia danica or Danish Scurvygrass
Alliaria petiolata or Jack-by-the-Hedge , Garlic Mustard and Hedge Garlic
Cardamine hirsuta or Hairy Bitter-cress
Rorippa nasturtium-aquaticum or Water-cress
Family 87: the Brassica, Crucifer or Cabbage Family, scientifically known as the Brassicaceae, has approx 52 genera in the British Isles according to Stace! Not all are strictly native but it is an important family for our well known vegetables such as all types of cabbages, radishes, and root vegetables such as Swedes and Turnips!
I use colour coding for easy reading! Blue background is general information about the plant from Online Atlas. Green is about all the uses except for medicinal uses or if there is a warning in which case I use a pink background.This time most pictures are from Wikipedia and illustrations by Köhler–s Medizinal-Pflanzen , Johann Georg Sturm (Painter: Jacob Sturm) – Figures from Deutschlands Flora in Abbildungen at http://www.biolib.de, Public Domainas well as other illustrations as added in links.
Please use the Jump-links in the Contents in order to get easily to the plants described on next page!
This has 16 families described in Stace, and on the next page, we continue with family 10 to the last family 21, which all grow in the British Isles in various habitats.
I use colour coding for easy reading! Blue background is general interesting info (although I hope you find it all interesting!!). Green is about all the uses except for medicinal uses or if there is a warning in which case I use a pink background. Pictures by Matt Summers unless stated.
I added contents where you can jump to the correct fern family or genuson next page.
This is part 1 of all those ferns and fern- allies growing on the British Isles as well as many other countries in the temperate or even tropical world!
Ferns flourished before all the flowering plants came on earth and still thrive in many niche areas all over the world.
It is a large and divers group and a short account of their classification follows on the next page. For each group there may be one or two important species which have some story to tell or ethnobotanical use!
Below is a lovely short poem about the Ferns, written for the former students of and by Ian Trueman, Emeritus Professor in Plant Ecology, University of Wolverhampton many years ago.
Ferns
When the green weeds rose from the sea
We, the great-leaved plants, were the last to raise our heads.
But we soon became perfect in the horsetail forests,
The PTERIDOPHYTES or Ferns & Fern-allies have varied habit and leaf structure but are distinctive from the flowering plants in that they do not bare flowers but have spores and spore structures, which are an important identification feature.
The life cycle of the fern has two different stages;
In my previous post I’ve written all about the useful Sedge family or Cyperaceae. This is a much shorter post about the closely related Rush Family or the Juncaceae.
In particular the genus Juncuslooks very similar to Scirpus and other bulrushes in the Sedge family.
Well; ‘all the proof is in the flower’ of course but you have to look close-up in order to see that as from a distance they will look similar!
Two beautiful illustrated websites are by Lizzie Harper and also see Wayne’s Word about Flower Terminology. A good flora is always helpful of course and you can find a recommended book list and links in my previous post on Cyperaceae. A website I often use, if you are regularly following my blog, is the Leicestershire and Rutland based Naturespot. This is a most useful, descriptive and active site showing many good photographs!
This family only has 2 genera: Juncus or Rushes and Luzula or Wood-rushes.
As I did in previous post I will just list the most common species in the B.I. on the next page. This can be found through the distribution maps in the back of Collins pocket guide in Grasses, Sedges, Rushes & Ferns of Britain and Northern Europe .
These maps are a useful feature as most plants used by us in one form or the other would be the common species anyway!
Rare species are not going to be used as food, medicine or building materials. Although saying this: they would have probably been collected and used as an ornamental plant by the Victorians, who loved unusual varieties such as can be found in the ferns for example.
But in the present day collecting of wild plants is a taboo! And of course which were common wild flowers then could now be very rare!
I will also be using my own Flora of Birmingham and the Black Country from now on for all my future posts as this is my local or area and why didn’t I think of this before?
I use colour coding for easy reading! Blue background is general interesting info (although I hope you find it all interesting!!). Green is about all the uses except for medicinal uses or if there is a warning in which case I use a pink background.Pictures with gratitude by Mike Poulton unless stated.
Please use Jump-links in the Contents in order to get easier to the plant description on next page!
Today I am inspired to write about the members of the large Sedge and Rush family or Cyperaceae. I recently helped my friend Sally harvesting many stems of the Common Club-rush or Schoenoplectus lacustris in order for her to make many beautiful items after they have dried in about 6 weeks time!
This is an important native plant which can be used to weave mats, baskets or any other implements as you can find out more on the next page and it even got edible and medicinal uses!
It is one of those plants which could feature in a real Ethnobotanical Garden instead of this virtual one to demonstrate all its uses it had in the past but could certainly be again in the future! Below some of the pictures taken by my friend on our recent adventure harvesting the Common Club-rush.
Harvesting, gathering and stacking bundles of Common Club-rush ( by S. Hares)
Most information is from specialist websites for which I provide the links for you to find more information and pictures of the plants. I use colour coding for easy reading! Blue background is general interesting info (although I hope you find it all interesting!!). Green is about all the uses except for medicinal uses or if there is a warning in which case I use a pink background. Pictures by Matt Summers or Mike Poulton unless stated.
Please use Jump-links in the Contents to easily find the different members of this large family!