Botany 2015 - Tuesday

The fatigue of almost non-stop meetings and talks is beginning to set in. From the street level, the meetings are taking place on three lower levels. There are 130 steps from the top to the bottom, and only the up escalator is working. Everyone is getting a workout. Let's see what has been learned?
A tremendous diversity of herbaceous sphenophyllophytes existed in the Permian; those would be horsetails and their close relatives. Pollen tube growth is not related to flower size in waterlilies, in fact they grow slower in the huge Victoria waterlilies. A lot of creative ways exist for small collections to relate to people and if you want such information you can find it at small collections network.  It's still OK to call yourself a morphologist, which is good because TPP are one. A lot of nasty plants are terribly invasive and rather hard to control. Botanists can take a long time to decide how to spend very small amounts of money. Botanists in general are really nice to students who come to these meetings. Such a small sampling. Oh, and TPP discovered a lovely new sandwich: a toasted brie with red onions and blueberries sandwich. Seriously good stuff.

Botany 2015 -Monday

Botany 2015 is huge for a botanical meeting, around 1800 people attending from a dozen or so different scientific societies; this is about double our usual annual meeting. The meeting is taking place in the colossal Shaw Center which sprawls down from "uptown" toward the river like a tiered greenhouse, which is strangely appropriate and partly what it is, but a lot of up and down stairs. TPP pities a colleague who blew out her Achilles tendon and arrived with a walking boot on!  TPP has learned that Edmonton is sort of a surprising city but you can't get here from anywhere very easily, and everyone has travel horror stories. Yesterday was a lot of meetings, followed by a lecture about how "cool" botany is, and then a big social event. Nice to see so many old friends and colleagues, young and old, and to catch up on everyone. Spent the morning listening to research about invasive plants. Take home advice: do not fertilize tree of heaven.