Botany

The fate of an American landmark is one of the saddest stories in recent history. The American Chestnut tree was an integral part of the forest landscape when settlers arrived on American shores. However after a airborne virus was introduced, the trees were wiped out by the billions.

The Himalayan blackberry is a beautiful plant in spring and summer. It produces delicious blackberries, but it's an invasive species and grows aggressively.

For some duckweed is a menace, for others it's a Godsend. Here in Brazil, we have built duckweed ponds and are encouraging it to grow to use as an animal feed . This is just one of its many uses.

The rainbow eucalyptus is an unusual tree with a beautiful, multicoloured trunk. The trunk's colours change as the tree sheds strips of bark, creating living art.

Ferns are attractive plants with interesting features. They exist in both wild and cultivated forms. The western sword fern is a common and often impressive plant in coastal British Columbia.

The hedge bindweed or morning glory twines around other plants and interferes with their growth. Bindweed produces large and beautiful flowers in summer.

Hellebores bloom mainly in late winter and spring. Their flowers are an attractive and welcome sight in nature, gardens, and landscaped areas. Lenten and Christmas roses are both types of hellebores. Many other species and cultivars of hellebores exist, offering gardeners some interesting choices.

The giant hogweed causes burns and blisters. Grapefruit juice interferes with many medicines. The chemicals that cause these effects are called furanocoumarins.

The monkey puzzle tree is a very strange and interesting plant. It's native to South America but grows in parks and gardens in other areas as an introduced plant.

Unripe lychees and ackee fruits contain toxins. Both fruits should be eaten only when ripe. In addition, it's very important that ripe ackee is prepared properly.

English and Spanish bluebells and hybrids between the two species live in British Columbia and in Britain. In each location, the flowers are admired for their beauty but are also a concern. The concerns are a little different in each location but are important.

The Abutilon menziesii is a native plant in Hawaii, endemic and federally listed as a critically endangered species with only about 500 plants remaining in fewer than 10 naturally-occurring populations throughout the Hawaiian islands. This sprawling shrub is known as Koʻoloa ʻula in Hawaii.

TheCereus repandus f. Monstrosa or Monstrose Apple Cactus as it is commonly known is found in gardens in Arizona and for a month in the Spring each year produces beautiful flowers, each lasting one day, for about a month.

Are you sure your houseplants are not hearing and discussing you? Find out what facts will make you believe in it.

Some carnivorous plants such as bromeliads and pitcher plants possess pools of liquid which they use as pitfall traps. Within these pools are rich communities of microbes and tiny invertebrate animals which have evolved to inhabit these pools.

The bunya pine produces huge and often very heavy cones. Its large seeds are both edible and tasty. The tree has a strange appearance and some unusual features.