May the peas be with you
Charles Stirton will be giving a zoom talk on the legumes of the Cape Core flora of southern Africa. on the 19th May 2021. Details will be uploaded as soon as I receive them.
Short description of the talk:
The pea family is the 2nd largest family (764 species) in the Core Cape Flora and is the 6th largest (40 species) in the Extra Cape Flora, the two regions of focus in this talk. Despite this impressive diversity so much is still unknown about their ecology, conservation status, response to fires, soil preferences, seed dispersal, germination, and seedling diversity, and their interactions with other organisms such as ants, bees, aphids, fungi, and bacteria. Although more is known about their taxonomy, economic uses, distribution patterns, and invasiveness knowledge are still patchy. Selective examples will be used to highlight our current knowledge and research. The talk is dedicated to the significant role being played by amateur botanists and iNaturalist observers in addressing gaps in our knowledge.
