Determining the Name of a Plant (Since They Can't Tell You Themselves)

Today, I spent time identifying one of Kona Kai’s many beautiful plant specimens because someone asked about it on The Galloping Gardener blog (January 24th, 2011 entry).

       

If a botanist is not certain of a plant’s identity, he/she consults a key. (A key provides a way to determine a plant’s identity by offering a hierarchy of choices.)  If you know a plant belongs to a certain family or genus, you can then choose a more specific key. In this case, I knew the plant was an orchid tree, and there are many species of this plant in the genus Bauhinia. After confirming the genus was correct, I sought out a good key for Bauhinia, which I found online in The Flora of China.  Although this key did not include every documented species of Bauhinia, it includes many common species, among which I found one that matches our tree: Bauhinia purpurea. 

       

When you look at a key, much of it looks like it is written in a different language, thanks to terms like “spathaceous,” “abaxially tomentose,” and “suburuloteculentually miscendopricular.”  Just kidding about the last term, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see it turn up in a key somewhere. This is because Latin heavily influences botanical terminology; thus it helps to know Latin terms or at least have a dictionary nearby to understand what terms mean.  Two indispensable references I use to help with terminology are Botanical Latin by William T. Stearn and Plant Identification Terminology by James and Melinda Harris.

Rick Hederstrom

Associate Director

A Bizarre Dream

Not to say that installing BG-Base isn’t totally awesome and full of action/adventure in real life, but in my dream last night it was a huge ordeal involving representatives (some good, some evil) from a variety of organizations, many miles of traveling (in cars, planes, and helicopters) to get BG-Base to its destination, and no shortage of action and suspense in doing so.  New movie idea?  Title ideas welcome...

Rick Hederstrom

Associate Director

Irrigation Adventure

For the past few days we’ve been trying to figure out why our water meter was running so fast.  The bad news: at least half of the irrigation pipe was under our main sidewalk, which we would have loved to dig up completely to find the leak, but we just really weren’t in the mood today.  Fortunately, our grounds manager, Veronika, was able to point out an area where she thought the soil was wet and the palms were growing faster than normal.  With the assistance of Florida Keys Aqueduct Authority staff and their specialized equipment, a hidden split in a pipe connector was found in this area. Veronika and David, our maintenance specialist, quickly replaced the broken pipe.  We had to remove some small plants to fix the leak, but that was little problem, especially considering the leak could have been under something like our robust Cuban petticoat palm (Copernicia macroglossa).  I’ll be looking to procure a new species for this spot in our collection that will fit our ethnobotanical mission.


Rick Hederstrom
Associate Director

A Great Start

Still getting settled in here at Kona Kai.  We loaded BG-Base on my new 27” iMac using Parallels and Windows 7 Pro and some phone assistance from Mike O’Neal of BG-Base.  It’s pretty awesome running BG-Base on the iMac…you really can have your cake and eat it, too!

For lunch Joe and I went to Ballyhoo’s (a restaurant right across the street) for their Tuesday special – homemade meatloaf with green beans and mashed potatoes - which was great; reminded me of good meals back home in Ohio.  For dessert, I sampled their Key lime pie, which was fantastic.  It was the first time I had a real piece of Key lime pie, so it was quite an occasion!


Rick Hederstrom
Associate Director