April 26 Nature Neighbor - plants!
Our nature neighbors today are plants - but not just any plants. On iNaturalist, we prefer not to have cultivated plants, but we are interested in any plants that weren’t planted by people. We are very interested in learning more about non-native plant spread, and in native plants that grow naturally in urban habitats. Easy challenge - weeds, hard - native plants that weren’t planted.
Comments
@merav, we have some interesting projects that show the spread of fumitories, geraniums, and cranebills.
https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/fumaria-species-in-the-usa
https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/geraniums-and-cranesbills-santa-clara-county
The fumitories project was started as a study to watch the spread of Fumaria muralis in the Bay Area. A few years ago, there were hardly any. Now, they're all over the place. There were a lot of incorrect IDs in iNaturalist because the Jepson eFlora key is wrong. A botanist from Italy (blue_celery) has been an enormous help in identifying many species of fumitories in the Bay Area and elsewhere in the US. It's very interesting to see how these plants spread quickly in the mediterranean-like climate of the Bay Area.
wow, these projects are amazing! makes me want to go out and find some weeds!
Add a Comment