Weeds and Aliens

 
Weeds and Aliens (1961) by Edward Salisbury (the man had more honorary titles than I have teeth) is the absolute classic book that pioneered the modern study and appreciation of wild plants in a globalized, man-made environment. I have not completely read it but you only need to read 10 pages to understand that this book is fundamental to a way of looking at plants (and the world) that is still edgy. Everything Richard Mabey has ever written is a mere footnote to this book. Peter del Tredici, Emma Marris and the entire novel ecosystems/anthropocene line of thinking should cite Salisbury's book out of habit.

Weeds and Aliens was published as part the same New Naturalist series that included the Fitter book on the Natural History of London. Where biology has now moved into the ivory tower of DNA-sequencing this is still old school and everything Salisbury did every plant spotter or gardener can do. It is experimental science with everyday materials. He collects data on seeds, soil and distribution but Salisbury does it with an intelligence and memory that few people can match. It is a tough book to read, its scope is encyclopedic but not with a desire to collect all the knowledge of the world but out of desire to share with his readers the excitement of the versatility of plants and the geographic narrative of a industrializing world they tell. It is old fashioned and refreshing at the same time to meet a writer who does assume his readers to be idiots and expect them to want to know everything to the last detail. How else can he excite if the facts themselves are left out? 

Weeds and Aliens is a book for nerds. Maps, lists, raw data. drown in it and be happy.

Wild plants in Berlin after 1945

Without a countryside to go to the plant watchers of West Berlin looked within the city and urban ecology was born out of the surprise of what they found. So the story goes. A very nice article is 'Flora and Vegetation Reflecting the Urban History of Berlin' by Herbert Sukopp (2003). The effects of the Blitz on the wild plants of England and especially London has been covered here, here and for WW1 France here. Sukopp writes about Berlin in '45.

In a historical context, sites bombed during World War II have played an important part in the development of the urban flora and its investigation. Only few years after the bombing various plants had colonised the ruined houses. In many cities the war damage and its effects gave rise to special studies of the rubble flora and fauna (Düll and Werner 1955/56, Scholz 1960 and others). During the colonisation of rubble, which offers warmer and drier conditions than natural habitats, plants and animals from warmer regions of the world found suitable conditions. Many plants that had been rather rare have become permanent membersof the urban flora in war-damaged Berlin.

After World War II an intensive and spontaneus development of vegetation began on the rubble, proceeding in more or less rapid succession from short-lived and perennial stages of herbaceous vegetation to shrub and forest-like stands. The variety of species on such inner-city waste land is surprisingly large. Thus a site at Lützowplatz in Berlin-Tiergarten accommodated 140 species of seed plants and at least 200 taxa of insects (Weigmann et al. 1978).

Dispersal of organisms and development of vegetation can be studied on rubble sites on a large scale and in an environment that differs considerably from previously known ruderal places. As Pfeiffer (1957) wrote: “The recolonization of rubble, created in many cities due to the activity of bombers in the last war, has unintentionally become a tremendous natural experiment, which with respect to its size, must be compared to the colonisationof new habitats created by volcanic activity”

Polemobotany or war botany

 

Polemochores, 'seeds distributed by dispute'.  Quote from.

Surtsey and the tomato as weed

The island Surtsey arose from the sea, south of Iceland, in a volcanic eruption that took from 1963 to 1967 to complete. Like Krakatau it has been extensively monitored by ecologists and biologists studying biological succession.

Here is how John McPhee writes about in The Control of Nature (1990):

From Surtsey's inception, scientists of many disciplines have carefully observed the island, taking advantage of any number of exceptional opportunities - for example, to observe the very beginnings of the process of forest succession, as seeds from who knows where invade and colonize freshly forming soil. For many months, they watched intently for the first green shoot to make its appearance in the black grit. This could offer insight so deep it might extend illumination even as far as the Silurian world. At last, a leaf appeared, unfurled, and was followed by a vine - a tomato plant.

The first plant to arrive was actually sea rocket, but the story of the vagrant tomato is well known. Introduced by human defecation (it was well manured, yes) and removed. 

If you want to know history, know the plants.

After the war [wild flowers in Somme summer 1917]

"Never shall I forget my first sight of the Somme in summer-time. I had left it mud, nothing but water, shell-holes and mud—the most gloomy, dreary abomination of desolation the mind could imagine; and now, in the summer of 1917, no words could express the beauty of it. The dreary, dismal mud was baked white and pure—dazzling white. White daisies, red poppies and a blue flower, great masses of them, stretched for miles and miles. The sky a pure dark blue, and the whole air, up to a height of about forty feet, thick with white butterflies: your clothes were covered with butterflies. It was like an enchanted land; but in the place of fairies there were thousands of little white crosses, marked "Unknown British Soldier," for the most part. (Later, all these bodies were taken up and nearly all were identified and re-buried in Army cemeteries.) Through the masses of white butterflies, blue dragon-flies darted about; high up the larks sang; higher still the aeroplanes droned. Everything shimmered in the heat. Clothes, guns, all that had been left in confusion when the war passed on, had now been baked by the sun into one wonderful combination of colour—white, pale grey and pale gold. "

From:AN ONLOOKER IN FRANCE 1917-1919, by WIlliam Orpen.

For a decade I have kept a record of the wild plant on two diverse areas

I had completely forgotten about this until I reread it recently. It's from Aldo Leopolds 'Sand County Almanac' (1949). Neighbourhood ecology at its best and the impetus behind my own weeds in my street surveys. 

[O]n week ends my floristic standard of living is that of the backwoods, while on week days I subsist as best as I can on the flora of university farms, the university campus, and the adjoining suburbs. For a decade I have kept, for a pastime, a record of the wild plant species in first bloom on these two diverse areas:

Species First Blooming in	Suburb and Campus	Backward Farm
April	14	26
May	29	59
June	43	70
July	25	56
August	9	14
September	0	1
Total visual diet	120	226

It is apparent that the backward farmer's eye is nearly twice as well fed as the eye of the university student or businessman. Of course neither sees his flora as yet, so we are confronted by the two alternatives already mentioned: either insure the continued blindness of the populace, or examine the question whether we cannot have both progress and plants.

De-domesticated plants

 "Looking for Ways to Beat the Weeds" is a recent article in the NYT by Carl Zimmer that looks at the way agricultural plants can evolve weediness. 

Scientists have documented three different ways that plants evolve into weeds. Many species, such as barnyardgrass, evolved from wild ancestors. Biologists have found that certain traits make it easier for wild species to become weeds. They already grow fast, for example, and make lots of seeds. 

Parasitic plants are especially well-suited to the weedy life. They wrap around other plants and send their roots into their hosts’ tissues. Rather than making their own food, parasitic plants steal nutrients from their hosts. The parasitic weeds that invade farm fields have not evolved major differences from the ones that attack wild plants.

In other cases, weeds evolved from the union of wild plants and crops. In the 1970s, for example, wild beets in Europe released pollen that fertilized sugar beets growing on farms miles away.

Crops can even turn into weeds. “We domesticated a plant from the wild, and somehow it de-domesticated itself — which I think is pretty exciting,” Dr. Caicedo said.

Among these crops gone wild is a weed known as red rice. A key step in the domestication of rice was breeding plants that held onto their seeds when farmers harvested them. Red rice evolved fragile seeds that broke off and fell to the ground.

The name red rice comes from the russet tinge that the plant evolves as it becomes a weed. Dr. Caicedo and her colleagues suspect the color is produced from a pigment that helps the seeds go dormant — a trait that’s good for a weed but bad for a crop.

“If you’re a farmer, you want your seed to start growing when you plant it,” Dr. Caicedo explained. When weeds produce seeds, on the other hand, some sprout quickly while others go into suspended animation. Those dormant weeds create a seed bank that can sprout later, when conditions may be better for them. “It’s a fantastic trait for a weed to have. You’re hedging your bets,” Dr. Caicedo said.

These de-domesticated weeds don’t simply go back in time to regain the same DNA as their wild ancestors, scientists are finding. 

Once plants become weeds, they keep evolving. New mutations allow some of them to have more offspring than others. Foxtail, for example, evolved to crawl along the ground, where it wouldn’t be destroyed by combine blades. 

Weeds in my Street 2013

Like in 2012 (plus overview) I will try to record all species of wild plants that I find growing in my street (excluding grasses and mosses). I will also attempt to be slightly more methodological this year by only including plants when they are in flower and I will sort them by month. Also: I now have a new camera and it find that it is better in doing close-ups but worse in landscape pics so expect more of the former.

FEBRUARY

The common snowdrop growing on a street compost heap. 

APRIL

The weather has been unusual so far. It hasn't been insanely cold but It has been freezing well into April and there was little plant growth to report until the weather changed last week and a number of plants rose to the occasion. As you can see, apart from the dandelion, they are all white, small and fragile in appearance. Less then two weeks later however these plants are already vanishing from view, remaining like the last eruptions of a flu-virus. Other plants, ones that need a little more time and sun are now starting to show itself. 

Sheperd's purse.

Hairy bittercress hidden behind the leaves of some other plant, but you can see the small, round cress leaves .

Spring draba.

The spiky ones are thale cress.

Dandelion, the opportunist that out-opportunes all other opportunists.

 Chickweed.

Common groundsel, a nice, introverted plant, a shy dandelion.

Spotted deadnettle, found in the same place as last year when I thought It was a Purple DN. Thnx Claude.

A young stinging nettle. A plant that belongs to civilization. Richard Mabey writes about dead nettles still living on changed soil conditions from 1600 years ago. Will try to find one in full bloom later.

A thistle, probably a common one. I am breaking here my intention to only include plants when they are in flower, but I am guessing that it won't reach maturity. Last year I did not see any thistles in my street but I did see them in the neighbourhood. A welcome addition though it strikes me that where most people will take the nettle for granted they will react with less graciousness to the prickliness of the thistle. (And I was right: two weeks later these were removed.)

The first garden escape of the year is the Grape Hyacinth. I know this plant from my grandmother's garden and I never noticed it going native before. I don't think this one travelled very far as you can see from the inserted picture. Only a black merc between the two prevented me from giving you a landscape frame. According to Dutch wikipedia this plant is indeed found wild throughout the country.

MAY

We have seen this bit of street above for the dead nettle but there is also the narcissus/daffodil almost hidden away. Now this is a tricky inclusion because these are planted in parks and road bends all over town and you can never be totally sure but they are known to spread on their own and I think that is an example.  

A male fern in a shadowy, moist alley below street level just at they like it in 'natural' conditions. 

Wall-rue, a fern, mortar eating and eternal.

It took me a while to notice that the prickly poppy goes from yellow to orange and so I identify this one as a specimen of this ever more common plant.

Clover, what can I say, I like them drawn into my Guinness. I think of them more as grass than as plants.

The greater celandine is found at many places around my street, there are even more than last year, but this is the first one to flower. Elsewhere, where sun conditions are better they flower weeks earlier and grow to remarkable size.

The yellow corydalis originates in the Alps and has just come into flower as you can see.  

With it's dark leaves this species is suitable gloomy species to plant on your dog's garden grave, but what's it name? Most likely: wood violet.

JUNE

The ever pretty Wood sorrel.

Red Valerian.

The only serious plant spotter I know, Claude,  identified this as a Spiked rampion. It's on the red list of endangered species. Too bad then it has been weeded.

A cleaver. Was expecting this plant last year but didn't see it.

Serbian bellflower, nasty plant.

Wikipedia gives many vernacular names for it, Sonchus arvensis.

Common knotgrass, nice plant will try to take a pic when in flower.

Canadian Horseweed.

The bane of my life: Hollyhock. They grow between the pavement and the wall.

The Greater plantain.

A fascinating understatement of a plant: square-stemmed willowherb. 

Wall lettuce.

Wild Chamomile,  I think.

Hedge Mustard.

Smooth Hawkbeard.
 

Ground elder. Great for pesto people keep telling me.

One of the vernacular names for this is Death come Quickly. Why?

JULY

Oh I am so excited: the fat-hen is a staple of the forager's diet and I was hoping to find it last year but no. It was around in other streets but not mine. Now at the utmost corner, I have found one. I am going to login in Selborne and maybe we can follow its spread over the years.

Galinsoga, friend from America, it is polite here but will stay deep in autumn and grow and grow.

Red Shank, or Peach Herb in proper Dutch.

The only occurrence of this plant. A reader suggested common chicory last year. I tend to agree.

Sow thistle. Above is another plant from the same family.

The nettle-leaved bellflower. Last year there was only one and it now they have spread from that source in both directions maybe for 10 meters.

Completely forgot I had taken this picture, but it is in my street and I didn't know what it was, happily a reader suggested Colewort.. 

AUGUST  / SEPTEMBER

Ohlala! A blackberry (or bramble if you are from the UK). It has cold feet but knowing the species it won't last long. 

Sun spurge or according to wikipedia 'madwoman's milk': poisonous.

Autumn witch herb: deadly nightshade

Common in herb garden and grassy field: tansy.

A discovery that had me shaking in my shoes. It's already past flowering, anyone knows a name?

First found in the Netherlands in Tilburg in 1939, now it is everywhere: Senecio_inaequidens.

I think Dark mullein but I need convincing.