Cool Plants and Trees

[Michaelangelica]

Camellia sinensis

I pinched this great article on a most ubiquitous Camellia

FROM:http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=17607759&method=full&siteid=66633&headline=fancy-a-cuppa---name_page.html

I don't know if I agree that herb teas are not teas

FANCY A CUPPA?

All the facts and figures on Britain's favourite drink

By Samantha Booth

 

ACCORDING to a new survey, locksmiths and electricians drink the equivalent of 1.3 bathfuls of tea every year.

 

Sounds a lot, but considering what a nation of tea jennies we are, it's probably not that surprising.

 

Still, there are many other facts about Britain's favourite hot drink which are even more astounding.

 

Here are our top 25 tea titbits:

# Some scientists believe tea can cut the risk of a heart attack by 44 per cent when drunk every day.

# It is recommended that you should drink at least four cups a day for optimal health benefits.

 

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# Rich tea biscuits are people's favourite for dunking in tea, closely followed by digestives, custard creams, Jaffa cakes, chocolate hobnobs and chocolate chip cookies.

 

# Last year scientists came up with the perfect way to dunk your biscuit-by dipping it for exactly 2.3 seconds in tea served at 70C.

 

# The first book on tea was written in the eighth century by a Chinese scholar called LuYu.

 

# Tea comes from the leaves of a tree called Camellia sinensis.

 

# Although the tree can grow to 30ft, it is cut short like a bush so the leaves can be plucked easily.

 

# A huge 98 percent of people in Britain take their tea with milk, while only 30 per cent have sugar.

 

# Tea also contains zinc, folic acid, vitamin B6, Riboflavin B2, maganese, potassium and Thiamin B1.

 

# Elevation, climate, and soil are all growing conditions that will effect how a tea will taste.

 

# Tea first arrived in Britain between 1652 and 1654 and proved so popular that between 1699 and 1708, the amount of tea imported rose by six times.

 

# In the UK 98 per cent of all tea drunk is now brewed from tea bags.

 

# Tea first appeared in Europe in 1560 thanks to a jesuit priest called Father Jasper de Cruz. Tea is grown in India, Sri Lanka, China, Indonesia, Argentina, Kenya, Japan, Taiwan, Bangladesh, Uganda, Malawi, Turkey, Iran, Brazil and Tanzania.

 

# India is the world's largest tea producer.

 

# Anna, the 7th Duchess of Bedford, is reputed to have come up with the idea of afternoon tea in the early 1800s.

 

# About 80 per cent of caffeine can be removed from regular tea by pouring hot water over the leaves.

 

# Tea breaks are a tradition which have been with us for more than 200 years although between 1741 and 1820, employers tried to put a stop tea breaks because they believed it made workers lazy.

 

# Roots, stems, flowers and parts of plants are used to make herbal tea. Herbal tea does not come from the leaves of a tea plant, therefore, is not considered "real tea".

 

# You can make more than 200 cups of tea from a pound of loose leaves.

 

# A cup of tea contains half the caffeine found in a cup of coffee.

 

# Legend has it that the teabag was invented by a New Yorker called Thomas Sullivan in either 1904 or 1908 depending on which account you read. Annoyed at the cost of tin boxes, he sent tea to a customer in a small cloth bag instead.

 

# Darjeeling is called the champagne of teas and is grown in India's Himalayas.

 

# By the middle of the 18th Century tea had replaced ale and gin as the drink of the masses and had become Britain's most popular beverage.

 

# Tea is believed to have been discovered in China more than 5000years ago during the reign of emperor Shen Nung. Legend has it that this wise leader had decreed that all water was to be boiled to kill impurities. One day while visiting a distant region, his servants began to boil water when some tealeavesblew off a nearby plant and landed in the liquid.

 

# The emperor found this drink refreshing and tea was born.

 

# Iced tea was invented in 1904, at the St Louis World Fair, by a British tea merchant named Richard Blechynden.

 

# About 80 per cent of tea served in America today is of the iced variety.

 

# 'Drinking tea can cut the risk of a heart attack by 44 per cent'

[Racoon]

Hazelnut Tree

This post prompted by Turtle talking about Filberts :)

As he stated, before somewhere, our area is primo ground for Hazelnut Trees.

 

Some interesting scientific info on growing and Nitrogen:

http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog/html/em/em8786-e/

&

http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/hazelnut

Hazelnuts are produced in commercial quantities in Europe, Turkey, and in the American states of Oregon and Washington.

 

Hazelnuts are extensively used in confectionery to make praline and also used in combination with chocolate for chocolate truffles and products such as Nutella. Hazelnut oil, pressed from hazelnuts, is strongly flavoured and used as a cooking oil.

 

The Common Hazel is also an important component of the hedgerows that were the traditional field boundaries in lowland England. The wood was traditionally grown as coppice, the poles cut being used for wattle-and-daub building and agricultural fencing.

 

 

[Michaelangelica]

Probably need broadband for this

The Yew

http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/tv_and_radio/trees_intheprogramme.shtml

[Racoon]

Probably need broadband for this

The Yew

http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/tv_and_radio/trees_intheprogramme.shtml

 

You knew the Yew Micheal :naughty:

 

An interesting side note to the Yew Tree...

They are found and planted in and around graveyards and churches because the poisonous berries discouraged people from bringing their animals to graze there.

 

[Racoon]

Douglas-Fir

 

The common name honours David Douglas, the Scottish botanist who first introduced the tree into cultivation in 1826. The hyphen in the common name indicates that douglas-firs are not true firs.

 

The douglas-firs are medium-size to large or very large evergreen trees, to 20-100 m tall.

 

By far the best-known is the very widespread and abundant North American species Pseudotsuga menziesii, a taxonomically complex species (Li & Adams, 1989) divided into two major subspecies (treated as distinct species by some botanists); Coast Douglas-fir or 'Green Douglas-fir', on the Pacific coast; and Rocky Mountain Douglas-fir or 'Interior Douglas-fir', in the interior west of the continent.

The species as a whole is generally known as simply 'Douglas-fir', or as 'Common Douglas-fir'; other less widely used names include 'Oregon Douglas-fir', 'Douglas Tree', and 'Oregon Pine'. It can attain heights of 100 m, second only to the Coast Redwood (old claims of trees up to 126 m have never been verified), and is the state tree of Oregon.

 

Away from its native area, it is also extensively used in forestry as a plantation tree for timber in Europe, New Zealand, southern South America and elsewhere

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas-fir

 

[Racoon]

Tamarack Tree

 

link: more cool info on Tamaracks here

 

The Chippewa (or Ojibway/Ojibwe) word for tamarack is ëmuckigwatigí meaning swamp tree. The bark of the tree is used for burns. Tamarack used for internal medicine is said to be a laxitive, tonic, diuretic and alterative. The medical constituents of tamarack are a volatile oil which contains pinene, larixine, and the ester bornylacetate (Densmore 1974).

 

The Potawatomi and Menomini make a heat-generating poultice from fresh inner tamarack bark for inflamation and wounds, or steeped for a medicinal tea. They also use it as a medicine for their horses, either as a tea to help Menomini horses with distemper, or shreaded inner bark mixed with oats to keep the hides of the Potawatomi horses loose (Erichsen-Brown 1979).

 

Tamarack Trees as Technology:

The wood is very sturdy and today is used for house frames, railroad ties and fence posts.

 

[Michaelangelica]

Seaweed

Seaweed has to be a cool plant.

 

Looking off the end of 'my' pier today I saw at least 6-8 different types (One even seemed to have something looking like a flower??)

 

How does it manage to stay alive?

 

It lives in salty water that would rip the moisture out of any land plant.

How does it get nutrients from the roots if the sea floor soil is salty?

Some seemed to be growing on bare rock.

It gets ripped around by tides and waves every second of the day yet survives.

Lots of things eat it, including us, and is probably very central to the whole ecological scheme of things.

 

How does it work?:lol:

 

 

NEXT DAY:) Serindipidy

Just reading an excellent article in Australian Science Magazine Cosmos (Oct/Nov 2006) on people making discoveries by trying to mimic nature (eg Velcro) It talks about the coming crisis when we run out of workable antibiotics; due to the world wide growth in bacterial anti-biotic resistance

Peter Steinberg and Staffan Kjelleberg of the University of NSW looked at a sea weed that was keeping bacterial biofilms from growing on it (Delisea pulcra).

Delisea makes chemicals called furanones that jam bacterial signalling systems; With their signalling systems down, bacteria become unable to form and maintain a colony.

Synthetic furanones have now been developed and are being trialed for the prevention of biofilm growth on contact lenses.

The chemists estimate that 66% of human infections are caused by biofilms and furanones may have the potential of side stepping the issue of anti-biotic resistance.

 

Amazing, humble, seaweed eh!!:eek_big:

 

Next next day

Seriously not looking for this but. . .

Abstract Extracts of 13 Korean seaweeds, previously shown to contain antiviral activity, were investigated in more detail in order to learn the nature of the antiviral compounds and their mechanisms of action.

One extract, from Codium fragile, was active against all three test viruses (herpes simplex, HSV; Sindbis, SINV; polio), whereas the others were more selective. Thus four species, Enteromorpha linza, Colpomenia bullosa, Scytosiphon lomentaria, and Undaria pinnatifida, were active against HSV and SINV, but not poliovirus.

The other eight were active against either HSV or SINV.

In all cases there was evidence for photosensitizers, since the antiviral activities required or were enhanced substantially by light.

In general UVA (long wave ultraviolet) was much more effective than visible light in promoting activity, although the extract of Sargassum sagamianum could be activated equally by either.

In experiments to determine the site of action of these antiviral extracts, the predominant activity was virucidal (i.e. direct inactivation of virus particles), rather than inhibition of virus replication, although Sargassum sagamianum also could protect cells against subsequent virus infection.

These results imply that different antiviral compounds are present among the extracts, and furthermore the activities cannot be explained in terms of common ingredients such as polysaccharides or tannins.

We suggest that seaweeds may be a source of potentially useful and interesting antiviral compounds.

SpringerLink - Journal Article

 

TWO DAYS LATER

 

Seaweeds are stalking me

 

Swimming with Seaweed

Battling kelp in the 'swash' zone this summer might be the only interaction

you have with Australia's rich seaweed flora.

But the next time you get

caught up in a piece of wave-tossed kelp, it's worth considering the vital

role seaweed plays as a nursery and home for a myriad of Australia's marine

organisms.

http://nmdev.abc.net.au/science/scribblygum/december2006/

[Racoon]

Corkscrew Willow

Theres a few around here, and you know one if you see one, because the branches are unmistakable... Kind of Wiccan, if you believe that sorta' thing. :)

 

 

Corkscrew Willow - Champion Trees - Monroe County

 

The Corkscrew Willow [salix matsudana tortuoso (G. Koidz.)] is a member of the Willow Family Salicaceae. Originally a native of north-east Asia, it has a broad and somewhat rounded crown with young branches which grow in a spiraling twisted fashion which gives rise to the common name. The young branches are yellowish-green in color. They are frequently used in floral arrangements. The light green leaves are very narrow and about 1 and 1/2 inches long and are frequently somewhat twisted as well.

 

[Michaelangelica]

I was reading an amazing article on the white Willow. it seems the aspirin like components in it help cuttings produce roots! You gather a bundle of willow twigs leave them in water for a while then put your cuttings in the water. The water acts like hormone rooting powder! I will try to find the original article. I don't know if all willows work in the same way. In fact I don't know what a white willow looks like

 

Can't find the original article

but here is one on aspirin

Aspirin For Your Plants? Try it!

 

This looked like af un series . doubt if we will get it in Oz

Kew magazine

Question:

What do gunpowder, single malt whisky, a long bow, a leather belt, the Mary Rose and a Bramley apple pie have in common?

Answer:

They’re all made with the help of British trees, which have contributed so much to the rich character of this country.

Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew: Kew Magazine - Feature Article from current issue

[Michaelangelica]

Some amazing photos of some wonderful trees

http://hypography.com/forums/newreply.php?do=newreply&noquote=1&p=158441

 

courtesy Care2news network

[freeztar]

Ghost Orchid:

http://tropicfineart.com/Thumbnails/Ghost-Orchid.jpg

Ghost Orchid - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Epiphytes are cool! 8)

[Michaelangelica]

Dr Entwisle says there is no doubt this tree definitely rates in the bizarre tree stakes.

 

"It rates up there high, it is not so much the amount of growth, because people probably know strangler figs...can grow all over something, so in the tropics you get this trees that just sort of take over buildings, but what is of interest here is the way it produced fence-like protrusions from the side that you just wouldn't expect, so maybe give it a seven-point-five to eight out of 10."

 

A spokesperson for the Northern division of the National Parks and Wildlife Service, Lawrence Orel says the tree is a spotted gum eucalyptus maculate, "which is very common and widespread on the north coast".

 

Mr Orel agrees with the bizarre rating. "This is certainly one of the more spectacular forms of this type of over-growth I've seen."

The very odd tree. 28 Mar 2007. ABC North Coast NSW. (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

 

From Care2

[LJP07]

Excellent Thread Racoon:

 

Here's a selection of very strange looking trees, they really are cool:

 

Damn Cool Pics: Amazing Weird Trees

 

and.....

 

http://my.opera.com/Bj%C3%B8rk/albums/show.dml?id=75883

 

As for great plants, here would be a good one:

 

Nepenthes Villosa

 

Nepenthes villosa - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Ganoderma]

i suppose this fits? here is a pineapple that was growing on one of the families farms. very strange! its sitting on our front desk now as a decoration.

 

[freeztar]

Amphianthus pusillus

Pool Sprite

Pool Sprite (Amphianthus pusillus) Species Profile

[freeztar]

A scourge here in the southeastern US, but worth a mention...

Kudzu

[freeztar]

This is one of those bizarre things that could only happen in Georgia. ;)

This tree actually owns itself and the land around it...legally!

Tree That Owns Itself - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

If only conservation in general worked like this...