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Posts Tagged ‘flowers’

Mysteries Solved

Posted in Likes, Science!, tagged , , , , , , , , on June 22, 2022| Leave a Comment »

I attended the sort of progressive high school that allowed students to create their own classes. I decided to study the practical applications of plants, specifically their uses in food, textiles and medicine.

Basically, I cooked, dyed wool and made diluted poisons. Typical high school stuff.

I learned a lot about my local plants during that semester. What I’m not always great at is identifying new plants. That’s why I downloaded a plant identifier app. I won’t suggest the one I use because it’s just ok, full of tech walls designed to shunt you away from free options and toward a purchase, but I’ve charted a path around those barriers and can get the information I want.

That said, I’ve learned that iOS 15 users* already have a free alternative.

* * *

The feature is called Visual Look Up and once you know it’s there, it’s easy to use. It works for plants but also other subjects like landmarks, art and animals.

Today I learned you can identify plants and flowers using just your iPhone camera

Just open up a photo or screenshot in the Photos app and look for the blue “i” icon underneath. If it has a little sparkly ring around it, then iOS has found something in the photo it can identify using machine learning. Tap the icon, then click “Look Up” and it’ll try and dredge up some useful information.

Is it perfect? Not in my (admittedly limited) experience, but it is surprisingly good. My father-in-law sent me a picture of a mystery flower that had appeared (quite mysteriously!) next to his pond. Despite living in the area for decades he had never seen the plant before. Did I know what it was?

I did, in fact, have a pretty good guess. It looked an awful lot like a native plant Mr Man and I bought when we first moved into the house, the Blue Flag Iris. I ran the image through my app to be sure, and it helpfully appended “Northern” to the name. Points for me, but confirmation is always nice.

After discovering Visual Look Up I tested it on the same photo. It got me to “Iris” but without additional specifics. (To be fair, when I took a quick snapshot of the clearer image below and ran Look Up, it identified the plant as a Blue Flag Iris. Points for it.)

So next time you discover something mysterious that you don’t mind sharing with the tech giant in your pocket, try out this feature.

For a free option covering multiple life and other forms?** Recommended.

* * *

* Those in the US, Australia, Canada, UK, Singapore, Indonesia, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Mexico, for now. Not an iPhone user? I haven’t tried it, but Google Lens has similar functionality and works for both iOS and Android.

** But does it work on aliens?

* * *

Photo by Suzanne D. Williams on Unsplash

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Spring, with Ionone

Posted in Likes, Other, tagged , , , , on April 11, 2021| Leave a Comment »

There is a secret world coming to life in my back yard, goldfinches, dandelions, chickadees, red maple, cardinals, crows, robins, roses, insects, earthworms, that unidentified bush the bees love, and yesterday, the first butterfly.

At once common and precious, my spring smells of freshly-turned soil and violets.

Violets get their scent from ionone. It’s an extremely sweet scent that many people describe as also being dry. “Powdery” is the word that’s usually used. Another word is “ethereal,” or “ephemeral.” After stimulating scent receptors, ionone binds to them and temporarily shuts them off completely. This substance cannot be smelled for more than a few moments at a time. After that, people go anosmic to it. Then, after a few breaths, the scent pops up again. 

— How Violets Steal Your Sense of Smell

* * *

violets in grass
Photo by Darius Cotoi on Unsplash

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I Speak for the Trees

Posted in Other, Writing, tagged , , , , on March 31, 2021| Leave a Comment »

I usually try to stay fairly upbeat here but today I’m sad. 

The neighbors out back are taking down two big magnolia trees. Those trees always had the first flowers of Spring and I was looking forward to their pink and white petals. 

Photo by Chris F on Pexels.com

Nope. Instead, we’ll have a lovely view of the water tower a few blocks away.

* * *

Now, I know that sometimes you just have to take down a tree. We had to do it ourselves, when the Emerald Ash Borer came through. These trees didn’t look sick, but you never know.

Still. 

My parents raised us on The Lorax, and childhood books stick with you. It’s hard to see big trees come down. 

I’d hoped the new cardinal families that moved in over the winter would set up house and stay. They still might, but it feels less likely today. And then there are the tree-dependent squirrels. 

Right now I’m looking out at the back yard and it no longer feels quite as cozy, quite as welcoming as it did. We still have our trees and some at the near neighbors, but stretching away to the south the sky opens up and what I see now is suburbia, in all its generic glory.

Sigh.

* * *

All that said, it will be fine. I’ll indulge in a bit of virtual “hanami,” or “flower watching,” as cherry blossoms announce the first signs of Spring. I’ll think about ways to use the yard as a place for everything from trees to flowers to birds to squirrels to insects.

Himeji Castle is even more beautiful than when Mr. Man and I visited. 

And I think it’s time to pick up another bird feeder.

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Long Awaited

Posted in Likes, tagged , , , , , , , , , on April 28, 2017| Leave a Comment »

Finally! On Easter the last of our snow melted. We have flowers for the first time since winter arrived. This post is for my mother, who picked violets for her mother, once upon a time.

Happy Spring!

 

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On Tulips

Posted in Other, tagged , , , , , on May 14, 2013| Leave a Comment »

photo by Chris Willis

photo by Chris Willis

It’s Tulip Festival time here in Ottawa, and despite the unseasonably cold weather we’re having right now the flowers are beautiful. They also got me asking questions about the Festival specifically and about tulips in general. (If you are Canadian and a gardener feel free to stop here, you probably already know what I’m about to say. I’m neither and was happy to learn something new.)

Why tulips? Sure, the Festival is designed to promote trade and tourism, but there’s a nice story behind its origin. The tulips were “given as a gift in perpetuity to the Canadian people for having provided safe harbour to the Dutch Royal Family during the German occupation of the Netherlands”* during World War Two.

Princess Juliana was about to give birth in Ottawa but being born in another country would have affected the child’s succession status. Fair enough, but it’s not like the Princess could go home. So, in typically awesome Canadian style, when Princess Margriet was born in 1943 the Dutch flag was flown from the Peace Tower. Succession issue solved. How neighborly is that?

Wait, you may ask, isn’t this the same flower whose bulbs were once worth more than their weight in gold (and, not incidentally, also sparked the “Tulip Mania” market crash in the 17th century)? How do I get more of them? You may already know this but I didn’t, at least not in detail.

How do tulips propagate? As in, I’ve got this shallot-like bulb I picked up at the store and the package swears that if I put it in the ground I’ll get a tulip next Spring. Great. But what if I didn’t have this little net bag from the supermarket? If the Apocalypse comes tomorrow tulips are on their own. What then?

It turns out that tulips are well positioned to survive a catastrophic event because they are designed to propagate in not one but two ways. If you want to make more tulips, come Autumn you can either dig up the bulb or collect the seeds. The original bulb will have grown a number of little satellites, or offsets. The largest of the bulbs will flower the next year but the smaller ones will need extra growing time. Bulbs are exact genetic replicas of the original, while seeds will give you a hybrid plant with more genetic diversity, and the potential for new colors and characteristics.

This could be critical if the Apocalypse does come and you need new, pretty ways to match your landscaping with brimstone or mask the odor of zombie. Just saying.

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