Ohio Plants

 WEEK 3 : FLOWERS!
Flower Analysis Worksheets (4)
and
Identifications using Newcomb’s (4)
(due Thursday September 10)

A fuller appreciation of plant life, and a more engaging experience while carrying out identifications of angiosperms, can be gotten by thoroughly examining flowers. Flowers are amazing!

As Daisy pointed out in the video, late summer is dominated by members of the sunflower family, Asteraceae, the flowers of which are generally tiny, and packed together into flower clusters that resemble individual blossoms, like so:

These flowers are nice and all, but not suitable for this study of variation in flower structure. Ignore them for Part 1.

Again, while we are indeed studying the wild flora of Ohio, some ideal “flower parts” subjects might be garden plants because they tend to be showy-flowered, and may be even better than some wildflowers for learning flower structure.

PART 1: FLOWER ANALYSIS, 4 FLOWERS
(should not include Asteraceae, but may include garden flowers)

Find four flowers and look at them closely using your hand lens and a pair or tweezers (actually it’s better to have two –a pair of pairs of tweezers?). Just as we did last week for the TREES page, create another web page (“Pages” not “Posts“) named “FLOWERS” by cloning an existing page (your home page or the trees one), renaming it, and tapping “Publish.”

We studied flowers in the lab, and took notes on a worksheet that looked like this:

Again, ignoring the “FLORAL FORMULA” part for now (we’ll learn about that next week) please replicate this on your web page for the 4 flowers you have found. Include at least one photo –the closer the better but try to stay in focus –and include the same info as the handout. We’ve made a template for your web page that has a placeholder image and the text of the flower analysis worksheet. It looks like this (repeated 4 times):

FLOWER ANALYSIS WORKSHEET

Flower #1

This flower was found here (location and habitat/environment):

It is on page _____ in Newcomb’s Wildflowers

Common name_______________________________  Scientific name: ________________________________

Corolla:  number of petals _____  separate or  fused? ___________

Calyx:    number of sepals _____ separate or fused?_____________

Adroecium: number of stamens _____ separate, fused or arranged in any special way?

Gynoecium type: unicarpellate, apocarpous, or  syncarpous (and # of carpels =_____)
How can you tell? (Cite the features were apparent about the number of carpels.)

Flower type/ovary position: Hypogynous, or  perigynous or epigynous?___________

Flower symmetry: actinomorphic (regular) or zygomorphic (irregular)?

Additional distinctive features: _________________________________________________

Create this form by opening and then copying the text in this little .txt file:

FLOWER ANALYSIS WORKSHEET (link)

…and, because it is html code (eek!)  pasting it into your page using the “Text” editing function toggle up at the top right. Afterwards go back to “Visual” (phew!). To replace the silly flour with a serious flower, hover over it, see the pen icon that allows you to edit the photo and follow the prompts to replace it (alternatively, just delete it and add your own).

A sample set of flower analyses from May when there were oh so many flowers it was great can be seen on Dr. Klips’ web page HERE (link)

 

PART 2
IDENTIFY 4 WILDFLOWERS
(should not include garden flowers, but may include Asteraceae)

Find four wild plants in bloom. Identify them using your Newcomb’s Field Guide to Wildflowers. Snap a photo or two and present it/them on your web site along with the location and habitat, scientific and common names, distinctive features, and any other interesting things you’d like to share.

Have fun with this! It’s due Thursday September 10.