Though I am a scientist, I study the physics of the atmosphere, ocean and climate and not so much the living world. However, I have always been interested in landscape and environmental history, the human imprint on the land and the way the natural world impacts human society. I became more interested in natural history by reading old books by W.H. Hudson. Most recently I read Richard Mabey's book Weeds which made me interested in the unwanted, unsung, harassed and ignored plants that are so categorized. While I am trying to learn more about impressive trees and beautiful plants too, I am struck by what grows where we would prefer it not to or when we have left land neglected. But I confess a very low state of knowledge regrading botany and being a complete beginner in identification! I began this as a pandemic project. Without a car and avoiding public transportation, I was limited to where I could walk from my home in Morningside Heights, Manhattan so that was the Upper West and East Sides, Harlem, South Bronx and Riverside and Morningside Parks. To keep myself interested I started trying to identify the common plants and weeds I saw and my fried, Chris Raschka, suggested iNaturalist. In July my wife and I decamped for a month on the edge of the Catskills where I observed the plants growing back on a nearby abandoned meadow. For now I am planning to keep my observations to those of unwanted plants growing in human created environments (parks, abandoned lots and fields, building sites etc. pavement cracks etc.).