One of the grandest North American trees is the shagbark hickory. Continue reading A Tree for a New World
For more than 200 years, naturalists and plant enthusiasts have come to the woods along the Altamaha River in south Georgia, searching for a horticultural holy grail: a wild Franklinia alatamaha, William Bartram’s “lost camellia.” Continue reading Have Tree, Will Travel
In downtown Chicago, the city’s convention center, McCormick Place, dominates the landscape with 27 acres of rooftop. Continue reading Roof to Table
Clipped-grass turf is the most heavily used material in most American landscapes. Continue reading Turf Trials for Sustainable Lawns
The United States National Herbarium was founded in 1848, and it now holds five million specimens, with a particular strength in type specimens. Housed in the botany collections of the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History (NMNH), the herbarium’s collection is now part of a new crowdsourcing project that allows anyone with Internet access to view and transcribe data from specimens and contribute to the expansion of the herbarium’s collections database. It’s a terrific way to engage with plants as historical artifacts, design objects, and, of course, as botanical specimens, while essentially doing important work for the Smithsonian from the comfort of your own device.
After registration, which requires no special credentials or knowledge, you can begin transcribing the text from the labels into a web form. The data you enter, once approved, becomes part of the specimens’ record. Sylvia Orli, an information manager from the department of botany who helps facilitate the NMNH’s program, says the transcription project is part of a global effort to digitize natural history records. Within the NMNH, the department of botany is among the first to use the new crowdsourcing transcription tool, and several other units within the Smithsonian are participating as well.
“I could ask for no better monument over my grave than a good mesquite tree, its roots down deep like those of people who belong to the soil, its hardy branches, leaves, and fruit holding memories of the soil.” Continue reading Mesquite: Texas Stubborn
Most projects don’t have a soil scientist as a consultant, which leaves landscape architects to make important field decisions during construction. Continue reading Soils: The Measure of Moisture
