heart-of-grass

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I never post on here anymore :(

But I do post plant stuff and pics of my transdude face on my Insta @ heart-of-grass ! I'm adding more people on there too and I just put up all the spring ephemerals I saw in my story

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[heart-of-grass]

Darlingtonia Californica

One of the new seeds are this beauty. Probably one of my favorite.

Few years ago, I had a flower with this Darling’ and it’s really beautiful. But the seeds will be ready by January 2018… so the next flower will be from 3 to 5 years.

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Book of the month: How Forests Think

It’s hard for me to describe how much I enjoyed this book: as a long-time proponent of permacultural principles and a student of anthropology, the idea of a multi-species ethnography–one that took in to account all the tentacular relationships we have with other beings and “selves” on this planet–seemed very important and very timely.

If you’re not a social scientist and have never used the word “semiotics” in a sentence before, this might not be your cup of tea. On the other hand, if you are a social scientist, you’ll be in a place between wonderment and frustration reading this.

#books archive

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for some reason i definitely thought this was going to be one of those fuckin… infinite chocolate things. or like, some really weird trick involved. literally it’s just “put the tomatoes in some dirt and they grow into MORE TOMATOES 😱” which like… yea… that IS how plants work but i don’t know if it’s a life hack

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Hello! Although i've had a couple of plants for many years, i've recently been getting into houseplants more avidly. My collection is now of about 20-25 plants and it's becoming harder to keep track of watering ( especially with cacti and some less thirsty plants). I was wondering if you have a method of tracking, any app recommendations or just any tips at all?

Plants do not need to be and should not be watered according to a set schedule.  If we keep with the correct approach to watering as “whenever the plants need it”, then the method of watering should be based on a soil dryness cue.  I take care of probably 100 plants in 3 different locations.  Whenever I visit them, I ENJOY seeing how they are doing - part of that is to look at the soil and determine whether or not watering is required.  This does require a mental shift - you must think of your plants as living things, worthy of love and attention, instead of decor items that require constant maintenance.

So to answer your question: my method of “tracking” is to enjoy spending time with my plants and I will know when they need water.  I know this isn’t exactly the kind of answer you were looking for but this is truly how I do it!

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Via @indefenseofplants .

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Reptile fogger hack.

Crane elephant humidifier ($36, much less in the off season) 1.5” diameter PVC pipe ($1.50 per foot)

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Y’all… i went back to the store and he’s HEALED

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THOSE ARE THEIR BABIES?? HOW DARE YOU

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Why would anyone want to consume it!?

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🐶

The fact that cycad vegetative buds are called “pups”…. just fucking kills me - @ the national botanic gardens conservatory

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The fact that cycad vegetative buds are called "pups".... just fucking kills me - @ the national botanic gardens conservatory

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The very gorgeous flowers of Fabaceae

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Forest cover map of the US.

Keep reading

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AW MAN I wonder if I could keep nepenthes AND snail in the same terrarium, now-- probs not, but Im unsureif they'd eat the snails, or if they'd even slip in. i didnt know you could have a more tropical terrarium like that! wouldnt a nepenthes be able to live well at room temp, depending on the breed?

There are a handful of crossbreeds that do well as houseplants but I’m no expert. I just have my little ventrata which I got from the hardware store. She wasn’t in good shape when I got her, but she seems to be doing well now and she’s finally putting out new pitchers.

I like the terrarium idea is because I could grow lots of other plants that grow in similar conditions and really watch them thrive. Of course, a terrarium works best for smaller plants unless you’re willing to go for a bigger setup.  I think it would be a fun DIY thing if I ever have the space for it.

[heart-of-grass]

Gotta add:

David Attenborough's The Private Life of Plants: basically a botany 101 with a run down on everything from succession to zoophily.

How to Grow a Planet: a one time BBC special that is another really good primer for botany.

And if you're into paleobotany, Kirk Johnson, the current director of the Smithsonian, has made several videos you can find on YouTube about his work, and he's also made NOVA specials. I wish there was more full length docs about paleo plants, but there aren't! :(

ok so people have been asking me for plant documentaries ive watched so heres the ones I can remember immediately: 

David Attenborough’s Kingdom of Plants - this is just…..a cool ass plant documentary series (3 episodes long). if you’re looking for one to just casually chill and burn through over break, this is the one I would go with; its super interesting and is great for just chilling and seeing some cool plants doing their thing. basically David Attenborough walks through Kew in london talking about some of the really cool plants they have there lmao. I watched this on netflix but this video seems to have all the episodes squished together into a massive video so here

David Attenborough’s Plants Behaving Badly (Murder and Mayhem) - SUPER COOL documentary about carnivorous plants that actually gives a fairly well rounded introduction to the largest carnivorous families. 

David Attenborough’s Plants Behaving Badly (Sex and Lies) - part 2 of the one above. this one is just about plant sex, which can be REALLY interesting- focuses on orchids especially (as the largest plant family in the world, they exploit a ton of ecological niches and a lot of weird sexual tendencies). 

BBC’s “In The Mind of Plants” - about plant communication and cognition

What Plants Talk About - another about plant communication and behavior

The First Flower - about the question of the first flower, what it was, when and how it evolved and where, etc. flowers were a HUGE leap in plant evolution that came VERY recently; for millions of years, there were no flowers at all, and all plants reproduced with spores or rudimentary cone structures. this documentary goes over what we know from fossils among other things (paleobotany is a thing and its rad btw!!!)

Life episode 9: Plants - another one by David Attenborough lol but this one is the only plant episode in the whole “Life” series, and is on the same production level. there’s some pretty cool stuff in there but the linked version is crappy, I watched it on netflix

basically anything with Stewart McPherson. if you’ve been following my blog for a while you know he’s my favorite jungle-macheting botanist, and he’s climbed like 5894732952 mountains and discovered a ton of carnivorous pitcher plant species. his company, Redfern Natural History, does a lot of exploration and documentary work, including a couple things documenting his exploration of a few mountains, which are each about 30 minutes long. if you’re super into it like I am, you’ll also find his lectures rad as HELL (linked one is just on nepenthes of the philippines, and was done at the 2010 ICPS conference; it’s about 45 minutes and is def more detailed and focused around the botany of the plants themselves). 

also when i was searching for the links to these i found this giant playlist of random plant videos??? it doesn’t seem to be completely coherent 100% of the time but it’s pretty rad anyway

please add more if you have them!! any relating to mycology are also fine!!