Plant Identification Starts With Learning Plant Parts, From Sepals & Fused Carpel Tubes to Anthers & Bracts. This Plantlife Video With Sarah Shuttleworth Clearly Explains The Botanical Features Needed To Recognise Plants.
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In this video the features and botanical terminology of plants are examined. Examples of plant structures that aid plant identification are clearly provided.
It doesn’t matter if the plants are vegetables or weeds, the principles are the same.
Why Does Understanding Plant Parts Matter?
Understanding what different parts of a plant are called and what they do is essential if we are to talk about them. It’s similar to why its easier to talk about Latin plant names than English plant names. Most plants have several English plant names, and other names in foreign languages, so it’s important we all use the same language to avoid confusion.
It’s the same with plants, where it’s much easier to make mistakes than you think.
For example, take Bellis perennis, what must of us call a daisy. It’s that lovely little white flower we see on lawns. And when I say that I’ve just made an ID mistake. What we call a flower is actually a multi-headed (composite) head containing many flowers. Each of what we might think of as petals are actually individual flowers.
Now think about your root veg. Let’s start with potatoes .. are they a root crop? Well technically no, they aren’t. Potatoes are described as root crops but are actually tubers that grow from a modified stem.
Hopefully this is enough to convince you that to be able to talk about fruit, veg and flowers we need to all understand the parts and their names.
In this video you’ll be taught about many parts of plant flowers which is step one own learning about plant parts.
I thought the term was pistil rather than pistol?
It certainly is. And goes to show that even knowing the word confusing errors can happen.
I must confess I missed the error here, I typed it correctly but auto spell check then decided it knew better!
Apologies!