The long, bell-shaped flowers of the Yellow Corydalis
Dear Readers, what a clever, clever bunch you are! Winning this week is FEARN with 29 out of 30 correct (and you’ll kick yourself when you see which one was wrong). Liz actually answered all the questions correctly, and would have got 30 out of 30 if it wasn’t for getting the answers to questions 17 and 20 the wrong way round :-(, so I have had to give a score of 28 out of 30, equal with Fran and Bobby Freelove, who win the prize for the quickest response of the week. Sarah got a very respectable 15 out of 15 for the photos, but didn’t do quite so well on the second lot of questions. So, thank you to everyone who took part and commented, and watch out for next week’s quiz. It’s going to be a humdinger (whatever that is).
1. Herb Bennet (Geum urbanum)
2. Hedge Bindweed ((Calystegia sepium)
3. Feverfew (Tanacetum parthenium)
4.Pineapple weed (Matricaria discoidea)
5.Cuckoo-pint/Lords and Ladies (Arum maculatum)
6.Ivy (Hedera helix)
7. Green alkanet (Pentaglottis sempervirens)
8. Holly (Ilex aquifolium)
9. Red deadnettle (Lamium purpureum)
10. Loddon lily (Leucojum aestivum)
11. Lesser celandine (Ficaria verna)
12. Teasel (Dipsacus fullonum)
13. Garlic mustard (Allaria petiolata)
14. Dandelion (Taraxacum agg.)
15. Borage (Borago officinalis)
And here are some additional questions for those of you with stamina! The answer to each question is one of the plants shown above, and you can find the answers in the Wednesday Weed for each species.
16. Which plant has proved efficacious in the treatment of migraine?
17. Which plant has smooth leaves at the top and prickly leaves at the bottom, and why?
18. Which plant was Wordsworth’s favourite flower?
19. Which plant is the foodplant for the orange-tip butterfly?
20. Which plant got its common name from the blessing ‘Benedictus’?
21. Which plant has leaves that taste of cucumber?
22. Which plant was described thus, in 1913:
‘In bushy places, common; and a most mischievous weed in gardens, not only exhausting the soil with its roots, but strangling with its twining stems the plants that grow nearby’.
23. Which plant is also known as ‘pissenlit’ because of its diuretic qualities?
24. Which plant generates its own heat, to entice insects to pollinate it?
25. The seedheads of which plant were believed to be used as hairbrushes by the Banshees in the folklore of Ireland?
26. Which plant is closely related to chamomile?
27. Which plant is described thus, and is the County Plant of Berkshire?
‘White flowers hanging in severe purity from long stems’.
28.Which plant is the larval foodplant of the holly blue butterfly, and has been described as ‘the most divisive wild plant in the UK’?
29. Which plant is also known as ‘purple archangel’?
30. Which plant is ‘always green’ although its flowers are blue?
And finally, for bonus points: three of these plants are members of the daisy family (Asteraceae), but which ones?
Thank you Bugwoman for putting in the time and effort in doing these quizzes, they really are entertaining. Well done FEARN, that’s brilliant. We knew one of the ones to let us down would be the pineapple weed, one of those weeds we’ve seen a lot but couldn’t put a name to. We love to do the quizzes before breakfast as we’re always up by 5, part of our father’s training when we were children. We can almost hear him saying ‘nobody sleeps while i’m around’ 😁
My Dad was an early riser too – he used to leave the house to go to the Distillery at 4 a.m. and would leave at about 3 pm. Unfortunately, his boss never got to the office until 10 o’clock, so he always thought Dad was slacking off. Dad was never very good at the office politics…
Wonderful! Kudos to your efforts.
Well done to the clever winners! And you are over generous to me – I am sure I got four of those answers wrong (3, 4, 10 and 15).
Can you recommend any online courses for learning wildflower identification? I am frustrated by my lack of knowledge and would like to raise it to the next stage!
The BSBI do a course every year on plant identification which is good if intense – I think it’s full now until 2021 though, but they do have other ideas for courses at this link
https://bsbi.org/training-courses
Chuffed to bits and yes, kicking myself. (Lack of attention to detail as my school reports reliably noted) . I must mention that pineapple weed is very evocative as it used to (and still will) grow in the farmyard in west Wales where we went on holiday annually. Each time a tractor went past it would crush some and release that aroma. I have never confused it since!
Supplementary answer: Feverfew and Pineapple Weed are obvious. Third candidate: Dandelion!
I love pineapple weed, it used to grow all over our local recreation ground in East London (known as the Wreck for obvious reasons!) And yes, well done !
I loved this quiz. It brought back wonderful childhood memories of my mum teaching me and my sister the Latin names of the plants when we were in our garden in London, our granny’s garden in Cornwall, and countryside and seaside picnic spots. Our favourite name was Veronica beccabunga (water speedwell).
When I was studying horticulture, I found the Heritage Playing Card Company’s botanical and garden range helped with revision for plant name tests – I’ve got the Wildflowers, Trees, Cottage Garden and Herbs packs. I used to carry a pack or two in my handbag, so I could revise a few names whenever I had a spare minute!
I’m quite fond of Pentaglottis sempervirens meself. And I do love a Latin name!