Sedge Buster
Lesson 3
Genus Carex (the infloresence)
This is kind of interesting technically. The CB Lomo microscope has a knob on it. Ye turn the knob to 0.6 and the images viewed are 0.6 natural size. Then with a 30mm telescope plossl ep available from the desertscopes vendor, me an my bosom buddy Ray here(we have patched up our quarrel of last night) can take pictures about 25mm or a little more wide. So in this example we got all the Carex austrina infloresence except for the distal part of the terminal spike which we messed up disectin' anyway for Lesson 2. So what we have here is about six + different full spikes of the infloresence and a runt spike on the proximal, left end.
Sometimes botanists, eager for semi-fame get difficult with their lingo. So let's go over some of the lingo pictorially. Let's spell spike position terminology. All the spikes below the terminal spike, the one on the far right, are lateral spikes. These lateral spikes are, relatively speaking, proximal or distal. The out of focus one furthest to the left is the most proximal spikelet and it would be the one closest to the ground if this sedge was in the ground. Then as you go up, or to the right in this case, the spikes become more and more distal until you arrive at the terminal spike. Sabby? All righty then.
Now here nicely depicted above also are what are called bracts of the infloresence. At the base of those spikes sometimes there will be a great big long scale very similar to the scales that cover the abxial sides of the female peryginias. You may notice that such a one is identified in the photograph. Sometimes these can be really long, even longer that the whole infloresence. But most of the time they are much shorter than that. The lower one indicated here is pretty long, but it does not go way out past the distal end of the terminal spike like it does on Carex perdenta. Yer right Pat. C. perdenta has just the one spike.
_____
Dang it Ray! I caint figure out how to set the color for the letters and lines on these pictures.
Me neither, Crumby!
Genus Carex (the infloresence)
This is kind of interesting technically. The CB Lomo microscope has a knob on it. Ye turn the knob to 0.6 and the images viewed are 0.6 natural size. Then with a 30mm telescope plossl ep available from the desertscopes vendor, me an my bosom buddy Ray here(we have patched up our quarrel of last night) can take pictures about 25mm or a little more wide. So in this example we got all the Carex austrina infloresence except for the distal part of the terminal spike which we messed up disectin' anyway for Lesson 2. So what we have here is about six + different full spikes of the infloresence and a runt spike on the proximal, left end. Sometimes botanists, eager for semi-fame get difficult with their lingo. So let's go over some of the lingo pictorially. Let's spell spike position terminology. All the spikes below the terminal spike, the one on the far right, are lateral spikes. These lateral spikes are, relatively speaking, proximal or distal. The out of focus one furthest to the left is the most proximal spikelet and it would be the one closest to the ground if this sedge was in the ground. Then as you go up, or to the right in this case, the spikes become more and more distal until you arrive at the terminal spike. Sabby? All righty then.
Now here nicely depicted above also are what are called bracts of the infloresence. At the base of those spikes sometimes there will be a great big long scale very similar to the scales that cover the abxial sides of the female peryginias. You may notice that such a one is identified in the photograph. Sometimes these can be really long, even longer that the whole infloresence. But most of the time they are much shorter than that. The lower one indicated here is pretty long, but it does not go way out past the distal end of the terminal spike like it does on Carex perdenta. Yer right Pat. C. perdenta has just the one spike.
_____
Dang it Ray! I caint figure out how to set the color for the letters and lines on these pictures.
Me neither, Crumby!
posted by ray pistrum at Saturday, February 18, 2006
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