Identifying Plants Flashcards
Dryas octopetala - (Eightpetal) Mountain avens/ White Dryad/as
Rosecae family
Normally 8-petalled, but can have up to 16 naturally
Small evergreen sub-shrub, grows primarily on fast-draining gravels and limestone-rich areas where snow melts early.
Alchemilla alpina - Alpine lady’s-mantle
Hemaphroditic flowers
Seeds germinate without being fertilised - great number of variant “micro-species”
Empetrum nigrum - (Black) Crowberry
Fruits are edible (make a good jam)
Grows in acidic soils in shady, dry areas
Used in experiments on winter warming
Alchemilla vulgaris - (Common) Lady’s Mantle
Astragalus alpinus - Alpine milkvetch
Small, fleshy, convex leaves reduce risk of cold damage
Fixes nitrogen
Bartsia alpina - Alpine bartsia
Hemiparasitic - can photosynthesise, but doesn’t want to
Red-purple pigmentation reflects harmful UV radiation
Small, thick leaves and hairy cuticle provide limited resistance to cold
Sibbaldia procumbens - Creeping Sibbaldia
Forms low mat by extending stolons - hence name “Creeping”
Grows in clumps of herbage on rocky ground
Also made into tea by Inuits
Salix reticulata - Snow/Net-Leaved Willow
A dwarf willow
Grows on wet ledges and rocks (often slightly calcareous)
Salix herbacea - Dwarf/Least/Snowbed Willow
One of the smallest of woody plants
It typically grows to only 1–6 cm (0.4–2.4 inches) in height and has round, shiny green leaves 1–2 cm long and broad. Like other willows, it is dioecious, with male and female catkins on separate plants. As a result, the plant’s appearance varies; the female catkins are red-coloured, while the male catkins are yellow-coloured
Rhodiola rosea - Rose Root
dioecious – has separate female and male plants.
Rhodiola rosea is from 5 to 40 centimetres (2.0 to 15.7 in) tall, fleshy, and has several stems growing from a short, scaly rootstock. Flowers have 4 sepals and 4 petals, yellow to greenish yellow in color sometines tipped with red, about 1 to 3.5 millimetres (0.039 to 0.138 in) long, and blooming in summer.
Idiots try to sell it as snake oil
Tea?
Rubus chamaemorus - Cloudberry
dioecious
The cloudberry grows to 10–25 cm high. The leaves alternate between having 5 and 7 soft, handlike lobes on straight, branchless stalks. After pollination, the white (sometimes reddish-tipped) flowers form raspberry-sizedberries. Encapsulating between 5 and 25 drupelets, each fruit is initially pale red, ripening into an amber color in early autumn.
rhizotomous - multiple plants grow from rhizome - are considered to be one plant - “selfing”
Fruit is rich in Vitamin C, can be eaten with whipped cream and sugar or even fermented!
Pinguicula vulgaris - Common Butterwort
perennial carnivorous plant in the Lentibulariaceae family. It grows to a height of 3–16 cm, and is topped with a purple, and occasionally white, flower that is 15 mm or longer, and shaped like a funnel. This butterwort grows in damp environs such as bogs and swamps, in low or subalpine elevations
produces a “resting bud” during the winter
Salix lapponum - Downy Willow (Lapponum meaning “of Lapland”
Low, much-branched shrub
Twigs hairy at first, hairless and rather glossy dark reddish brown later.
Leaves usually lanceolate (lance-like) to 7cm long by 2.5cm wide; slightly hairy to hairy on upper side; usually densely hairy on lower side; margins entire or subentire, sometimes a little undulate.
Petiole short, occasionally up to 1cm long but usually less than 5mm.
Salix lanata - Woolly Willow
Salix lanata is a low, many-branched, deciduous shrub
New twigs are hairy, but quickly become hairless and brown
Grey-green leaves are covered in silvery “wool” that disappears with age
Saxifraga oppositifolia - Purple Mountain Saxifrage
It is a low-growing, densely or loosely matted plant growing to 3–5 cm high, with somewhat woody branches of creeping or trailing habit close to the surface. The leaves are small, rounded, scale-like, opposite in 4 rows, with ciliated margins. The flowers are solitary on short stalks, petals purple or lilac, much longer than the calyx lobes. It is one of the very first spring flowers, continuing to flower during the whole summer in localities where the snow melts later. The flowers grow to about 0.5 inches in diameter.
Petals are edible - bitter at first but eventually sweet
