Plants Are Cool, Too!

Botanist and biodiversity scientist Chris Martine at Bucknell University has begun an online project called "Plants Are Cool, Too!" to spur interest in plants as part of understanding biodiversity. The first two in a series of roughly 15-minute videos are out on YouTube (PlantsAreCoolToo) and highlighted in a little promo piece from Bucknell, "The dawn of adventure biology". In each video, Martine goes into the field with folks who are exploring the world of plants and their histories. They're well done and worth watching.

The first episode, on "The Pale Pitcher Plant", explores its ecological setting in the Southeastern US and dissects its "stomach" to show both how it collects the insect food it needs in a soil-nutrient-poor habitat and how other critters collaborate in breaking down those unfortunates the plant has trapped.

The second episode, on "Fossilized Forests", heads to Clarkia, Idaho, and a set of sediments where leaves were trapped 15 million years ago at the bottom of an inland lake created when lava flows blocked a river. The leaves aren't just fossils. They're the actual leaves that can still be lifted from the sediments. Their structure and color have been preserved, and folks are trying to recover their DNA.