Collecting Plant Information

I had Blue Jay make a cover for a ring binder in which to keep her dyer’s notes. She took to that task immediately, using Corel Draw for her illustration. Now to fill it up. To start I’ll create some loose-leaf sheets with plant identification information and pictures. (This is going to test my color print cartridge replacement capabilities.)

[As an aside, one of my Internet research techniques is to, first, open up a Word document then start my internet search. When I find relevant or interesting pages, I’ll swipe the address from the browser, and copy it into the Word document with a word or two of description. That way I can move on quickly to browse other pages, but keep the best references just a click away. Bookmarks might be the preferred method, however, I can load these research logs up on a flash drive and always have them with me.]

To look up wildflower data for identification purposes I found that the Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center http://www.wildflower.org/ has abundant pictures. I looked up a Black Eyed Susan and found bunches of pictures showing the flower, the leaves and stem, and a field picture.

The USDA also has a web site for plants, a plant database, http://plants.usda.gov/index.html. This site has pictures. (They have citation policies for the use of these pictures which one would be wise to check out.) In addition the USDA site has information on a plant’s growth range for US and Canada, full classification, and threatened and endangered species information. We don’t want to be uprooting any endangered kind of plant, introducing a noxious plant to a non-native environment, or anything less than being good stewards.