Volume 1: Plant Life Flashcards
Early pioneers were just as creative as some our early scientists, as a consequence the names of many native species:
are named after cultivated species. Often not even vaguely resembling their namesakes, and not even distantly related either.
The exceptions are the native Figs, Raspberries, Elderberries, Bananas, Passionfruits, and Melon.
Also, the native Grapes, Tomatoes, Limes, and Cashew are members of the same plant Families as their namesakes.
big gaps in plant distribution
such as Chocolate Lillies and Black Plum reflect Australias growing aridity, and the restrictions of species to wet pockets separated by dry stretches.
opposite leaves
leaves are produced along the stem in opposing pairs
alternate leaves
are produced singly, alternating along the stem
pinnate leaves
each leaf is divided fractally into smaller leaf segments called leaflets (like fern fronds)
seashore habitat includes
coastal dunes, rocky headlands, saltmarshes and mangrove swamps
the seashore environment is rich in
edible fruits and leaves. Tubers are scarce or absent on temperate coasts but common behind beaches in the tropics.
many freshwater plants are subject to
extreme changes in water levels. Theyve adapted to this by developing starch and water filled tubers to tide them over in dry spells.
in the shaded rainforest, what is common and what is rare?
common: vines and epiphytes
rare: herbs and grasses
heaths are
communities of hard leaved shrubs and small trees found on infertile sandy soils in eastern and south western australia. They are rich in wild fruits but mostly snack foods as opposed to staples.
the food plants fall into three categories
they may be plant parts that are designed to be eaten (nectars and fruits)
or parts that are unprotected by fibres or toxins (most tubers and small seeds)
or they may have some chemical defenses that can be denatured by leaching or cooking (many large tubers and seeds)
pollination methods
wind pollination: flowers such as grasses, plantains, and pine trees are pollinated by wind. Small and dull in appearance with no nectar and no food value since they dont need to attract pollinators.
animal pollinated flowers are larger, more colorful and usually contain stores of sweet nectar
the largest flowers are those
pollinated by birds and mammals such as honeyeaters, lorikeets, fruit bats, and small possums.
flowers dependant on large pollinators need to
provide plenty of sweet nectar, and this makes them a good source of food for humans too.
australia is rich in what kind of pollinatees?
vertebrate pollinated flowers such as Banksias,
many Grevilleas and Tea Trees (Melaleuca),
some Eucalypts and Hakeas (Hakea),
the Waratah (Telopea Speciosissima),
the Honey Lambertia (Lambertia Formosa),
certain Fuchsia Bushes (Eremophila),
Grasstrees (Xanthorrhoea),
and wild Bauhinias (Lypsiphyllum Gilven, L. Carronii)
australias two most characteristic plant families
Protaceae and Myrtaceae
to make a weak mead
soak banksia, grasstree and bauhinia blossoms in water to ferment
seeds come equipped with
a store of food in the form of starches, proteins and fats. They are the most nutrient rich part of plants.
very big seeds are found on
rainforest trees, cycads, and plants of tropical seashores.
these big seeds can be a liability
to a plant for they are not easily dispersed and rats are strongly attracted to them.
big seeds advantage
their large food reserves are helpful to seedlings germinating in difficult environments such as gloomy rainforests or salty mudflaps.
along seashores the large seeds include
the coconut (Australias biggest),
Matchbox Bean (Entada Phaseoloides),
Beach Bean and certain mangroves,
all of which disperse by water.
large seeds in the rainforest include
the Bunya Nut,
Macadamia,
and Monkey Nut,
among others
hard shells such as (?) have very hard shells to (?)
Macadamias & Candlenuts have hard shells to deter rats
some plants with starchy seeds
deter rats by producing seeds laced with poisons. such as
the Cycads,
Moreton Bay Chestnut,
Matchbox Bean,
and several QLD rainforest nuts
small seeds are usually
poison free
australia has how many beans and peas
more than 850 native species
beans and peas are
legumes, and as such use the bacteria in their roots to draw nitrogen from the air which is needed to produce protein and to manufacture toxins
australias soils are notoriously deficient in
nitrogen, and most plants cannot afford to divert nitrogen from growth into toxin production. because legumes have free access to nitorgen, they face no such problem and thus are invariably well protected with poisons
fruits, like flowers, can be very
alluring with shapes and colours as they are designed to be eaten
some animals are more effective
dispersal agents. birds are excellent since they usually swallow the seeds whole and then void it far away. mammals use teeth and claws so are messy and destructive dispersal agents with the exception of the fruit bat who is very good at disperal.
over millions of years a close bond
has evolved between fruiting plants and the animals that disperse their seeds
most australian fruits have developed characteristics to make them
more attractive to Birds & Fruit Bats. demonstrated by the bewildering kaleidoscope of colors, shapes, and smells
two separate targeted groups of characteristics for fruiting plants
small brightly colored but not odorous to attract birds for they see colors but cannot smell (with exceptions)
AND
sombre, smelly and large fruits to attract fruit bats for they are color blind but keen sense of smell
fruit bats are largely restricted to
Northern and Eastern Australia, so bat fruits only grow in these regions
bat fruits are often
large with soft stringy pulp, a heavy musky odour and tropical fruit flavour. nearly all edible to humans
most cultivated tropical fruits and some stone fruits
were developed from bat fruits, notably the mango, pawpaw, banana, guava, custard apple, peach, apricot, and date.
bats hang downwards when they
feed, many bat fruits hang with them including the Pandanus, Davidsons Plum, Native Bananas, and cultivated Mango & Pawpaw
sprouting directly from the trunk
prevents access of fruit pigeons who cannot hover or perch there, thus are perfect bat fruits such as the larger figs and lilly pillies
bats are clumsy
fliers so the trees they feed in often have open canopys such as the pandanus, figs, cultivated mango, pawpaw and banana
pagoda structure
developed by some bat trees such as the Leichhardt tree and Sea Almond to assist the bats
bats do not swallow
large seeds so often drop them while squabbling with his fellows
the smaller figs seem to be
adapted to both bird and bat symbiosis
in the outback their are several fruits
adapted to emus such as the quandong, emu apple, wild tomatoes and nitre bush. Nitre seeds rarely germinate without first passing through an emus stomach which strips off the layer preventing germination
the red bopple nut of northern NSW seems to be
a cassowary fruit, although cassowaries in this area have been extinct for hundreds of years which may explain why the red bopple is rare.
the rainforests contain many pigeon fruits such as
the blue quandong, and crab apple
in the australian alps
all the fruits are small red, bird fruits.Unrelated plants like the alpine heaths, alpine raspberry, perching lily, and mountain plum have evolved remarkably similar shiny red fruits, presumably to make it easier for the few fruit eating birds to find them
bird fruits are often poisonous to
mammals including humans presumably to deter rats who destroy enormous numbers of forest seeds. bat fruits are much less often poisonous
apart from bird and bat fruits
there are some fruits that appear to be designed for dispersal by mammals and even reptiles such as the bolwarra, cranberry heath, and most geebungs have fruits that are green and inconspicuous to birds. geebungs and bolwarra fruits fall to the ground when ripe so their dispersal agents are ground dwellers
geebungs have
very hard stones and are known to be dispersed by kangaroos, although birds also eat them.
the fruits of the inland capers
are very large, strong smelling may be targeted at diprotodons and other extinct giant marsupials.
many heaths are mysterious in that
they have tiny green fruits and their dispersal agents remain a mystery
leaves are thin and porous
to draw in carbon dioxide
leaves are flattened & prominently displayed
to trap sunlight
unlike roots, leaves are
largely unprotected and vulnerable to animal attack thus most leaves are impregnated with tough fibres and toxic and distasteful chemicals.
human teeth are
generalised & thus unspecialised feeding tools. we cannot tackle woody & fibrous plant material without dramatic energy expendage
how to make fibrous plant material edible?
cooking can soften the plant tissues but it does NOT help in digesting the cellulose. u dillweed
as unspecialised feeders humans also lack
immunity to the arsenal of poisons that plants use to destroy your precious organs.
what can humans eat?
shit all
and shit too! :)
consequently there are not many kinds of wild leaves we can eat, most can be categorised as quick growing herbs or halophytes.
why are quick growing herbs sometimes safe?
they sprout after rain and channel all of their resources into growth and reproduction. Little energy is diverted to produce toxins or tough leaves. Their aim is to grow quickly and set seeds before being found by a plant eater.
fast growing herbaceous plants that live fast and die pretty include
native peppercresses
yellow cress
pigweed
parakeelya
many garden weeds
most cultivated vegetables
halophytes are found mainly
on beaches, saltmarshes, and inland saltbush plains.
halophytes get by
either by excreting excess salt onto the leaf surfaces (as in the bladder cells of saltbushes) or by absorbing extra water to maintain a constant salt:water ratio (as succulent plants do). The excess salt also serves as defense against plant eaters who are pantry-pansies.
removing salt from halophytes
boiling works, and most halophytes can be boiled and eaten as vegetables.
settlers ate many kinds of halophytes, especially
saltbushes (Atriplex, Rhagodia, Enchylaena, Einadia)
samphires
wallaby bush (Threlkeldia diffusa)
aborigines meat seasoning…
they often used Pigfaces which added a salty flavor to meat
even though they never heard of pigs before?! :o
the leaves of palms, tree ferns, and grasstrees emerge
from a woody trunk, in the centre of which is a core of starch - the undifferentiated tissues from which the frond is made.
most parallel vein leaves
(monocots) produce leaves from a single point, and in many sedges and rushes the soft growing cluster of leaf bases is tender and substantial enough to be nibbled. Bulrushes, matrush, and grasstrees can be harvested this way.
the stems of rainforest vines
are not edible, but are a useful source of emergency water. Cut neatly into metre lengths, they can be drained of their watery sap into a bucket. Vines yield copious water since their stems are supported by adjacent trees and do not need to lay down supportive woody tissue. Most of the stem is a tube for conveying water to the leaves, and the yield is consequently generous.
Native grape vines were known to colonists as “water vines” for this reason. The smaller vines with rubbery stems are the better water sources since older lianas become a lil woody ;)
plants depend on their roots
to provide water and minerals, and to anchor them in place. Many plants also use roots for storage. For plants that lack woody trunks, roots are the ideal places to store extra food and water, safe from animals and temperature extremes.
roots also serve as a nexus site for communication with the species-unique associated micorrhiza; a symbiosis allowing the organisation & transfer of important nutrition & biome-wide chemical signals in case the need to eradicate all humans finally becomes trendy
percentage of australian plants that produce tubers
fewer than 5%
the tuberous organs range from
swollen roots (root tubers) and underground stems (rhizomes or corms) to swollen overlapping leaf bases (bulbs).
in australia the main tuber-producers are
lillies, ground orchids, vines and freshwater plants.
a characteristic feature of australian woodlands
Tuberous lillies and ground orchids
Tubers spend most of the year
in dormancy, as tiny underground tubers. When conditions are favourable they send up leaves, flower, set seed, then wither and revert back to tubers for the remainder of the year.
many tuber producing plants are supported by
freshwater habitats. this environment is very unstable - water levels rise and fall - and many plants survive the dry spells by producing tubers that lie dormant in the mud
many vines and creepers also produce
tubers as a means of surviving harsh times
apart from the large leaved lillies
relatively few of austrlias tubers are toxic. Indeedy the tubers of all starchy freshwater plants (except taro and some water lillies), and of all the 700 australian ground orchids, appear to be edible raw.
poisonous plants almost always
warn of their toxicity by tasting bitter or acrid. the human taste buds are highly sophisticated and can easily detect most toxins. thus victims are often dumb-fucks and their children, or sometimes dumb-fucks who are children. its a win win anyway
there are however a few poisons
that our senses of taste and smell cannot detect. these include cycads, legumes, tie bush, finger cherry, and large lillies
many explorers were poisoned by
Cycads. the boiled or baked seeds taste delicious, but contain a potent toxin that must first be removed by leaching. Even the leaves of cycads are poisonous.
not much is known about
australias native beans and peas, but it seems likely that most are poisonous, and some are deceptively tasty. moreton bay chestnut seeds, for example, are very tasty when boiled, and even palatable raw, but in both conditions are posionous
when foraging i should be wary of sampling
uknown legumes. most species belong in the family fabaceae and have easily recognised pea flowers. Cassias in the related mimosaceae family are also a problem as the seeds and sweet pulp are purgative.
cassias have
showy yellow flowers and bean like pods.
a queensland child died
supposedly from ingesting the fruits of a Tie Bush. Also considered poisonous in India. These have a bitter aftertaste but are sometimes not unpalatable.
tie bush is
a small shrub of seashores, shady gullies and dry rainforests north of wollongong. Leaves are soft and thin, 2-6cm long, the bark tears in long strips, the small flowers are greenish-yellow with four petals, and fruits are orange-red, 5-15 mm long, containing one seed. NO GO, YO
known for causing perma-blindness
the Finger Cherry, aka Native Loquat (rhodomyrtus macrocarpa), found in northern qld rainforests. It is a shrub or small tree with blunt tipped opposite leaves up to 25 cm long, pink or white flowers with five petals, and reddish egg shaped fruits 2-5 cm long. The fruit has five small flaps at the end like a lilly pilly, but differs in containing a number of kidney-shaped seeds. Finger cherry is eaten in abundance by the abos, and it is posited that perhaps its an infesting fungus that causes the blindness.
any hoo, GOGO? nono, yo
large lillies including
the Cunjevoi, Taro, Black Arum Lilyn(typhonium brownii), Polynesian arrowroot and related large leaved lillies contain toxins in their roots, and often in their leaves and stems, which causes a burning pain in the mouth and throat if chewed. The onset of pain can take up to half a minute or so, which makes these plants very dangerous if large amounts are swallowed quickly. The fabo Abos kno how, but you know nothing, and you certainly aint fabo, so no; yo
water soluble nutrients such as
ascorbic acid and thiamine are extremely important since the human body does not store these vitamins efficiently enough thus they are rapidly depleted when dietary sources grow scarce
during the chemistry analysis, some wild foods tested exceptionally high in thiamine such as
Candlenut (4700 micrograms per 100g)
and
Doubah (2935 micrograms per 100g)
as a comparison, the richest commercial source is
Wheatgerm (2200 micrograms per 100g)
world record for ascorbic acid
the Billygoat Plum (3150 milligrams per 100g)
However other samples of the plum yielded lower (2850) but still exceptional.
other rich ascorbic sources
Hairy Yam (223 mg/ 100g)
Cynanchum pedunculatum fruits (119.2 mg)
Great Morinda (89.9 mg)
very few western plant foods
produce anywhere near 25 % of the Recomended Daily Allowance of ANY nutrient in a 100g sample.
YET, out of only 35 native plants that were analysed:
14 were found to provide at least 25% RDA of Potassium.
17 satisfied Iron.
10 for Calcium, and
7 had Zinc covered!
ok australia, i see you
best natural source of fat & protein
Kurrajong (Brachychiton populneus)
- 1% of Protein RDA
- 7% of Fat RDA
good protein sources
Candlenut (Aleurites moluccana)(7.8% Pro)(49.9% Fat)
Kurrajong
Caper Bush (Capparis spinosa)(7.2% P)(7.4% F)
Doubah (Marsdenia australis)(4.1% P)
Pigweed (Portulaca oleracea)(5.9% P)
vitamins and minerals
are not essential to short term survival. Protein and Fats are extremely important and easily obtained from insects and lizards.
the highest energy foods
are animals, seeds, tubers, inner shoots, and redbull. It is impossible to live on leaves, seaweeds, mushrooms, or overly lean meats like rabbit
only a few fruits can be relied upon as staples such as
Desert Quandong and Muntari
it is best to focus on
Tubers and animal foods which seems to be what the fabos done did
most watercourses are home to
at least one species of Tuber-bearing plant, thus it should be first frontier
the tubers of all
Rushes and Sedges are edible raw
in Temperate Australia
open forests and woodlands often harbour tubers. Seek out Bracken, orchids, lillies, and Murnong.
In rainforest clearings
look for Long Yams
animal foods include
Earthworms, Moths, Stick Insects, Cicadas, Lizards, Snakes (salvage venom glands), Tortoises, and Shellfish
turn over rocks and logs
for Termites (they are very nutritious), Grubs, and Centipedes
Grasshoppers
can be good for eating unless they been on a bender, messing with filthy hos, or have been feeding on toxic plants which all makes them taste totally like bugs eww
animals to avoid
Toads, green frogs, puffer fish, colourful catterpillars, stink bugs, and wasps.
all toxins can be denatured
FALSE!
sucker
plants with milky sap or red fruits
ARE NOT ALWAYS POISONOUS you mudblood
Milky saps can often be irritants, but the fruits or seeds of the plant arent necessarily so.
As wild figs, cultivated pawpaw & mangoes demonstrate: edible fruits are more likely to be red than any other color cos it appeals to the native bird’s natural born bloodlust
