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Living the High Life: Dwarf Bamboo and Other Montane Grasses in the Philippines
The warm and humid tropical regions of Southeast Asia has extensive tracts of forests, although it has not always been this way. But hike up into the mountains and amazing sights will greet the traveler, because once he or she moves up past the tree line, the world opens up as montane grasslands and their…
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Dr. Seuss’ Grickle Grass: A Pernicious Mindset and a Paean to the Tenacity of the Poaceae
I’ve been watching and rewatching the movie adaptation of Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax, and enjoying myself. It’s a fairly extreme pro-environment film, with the usual greedy businessman as the very obvious villain. There is also a questionable “co-hero” in the story who ends up destroying an environment and making it a “barren wasteland” after cutting…
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An Unlucky Parking Lot, Clonal Lineages, and Self-Incompatibility in Imperata cylindrica (Cogongrass)
Three years ago, I chronicled the invasion of an island in a parking lot by Imperata cylindrica (cogon grass), and how the property owners removed all vegetation from the affected island a few months later. This included two trees that probably were affected by whatever herbicide they used. Throughout the years, the island had remained…
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Growing Ornamental Grasses from Seed
Surprisingly, although I’ve grown rice from seed all the way to harvesting, I’ve actually never grown ornamental grasses from seed. So this year I decided I’d try my luck at it. On the face of it, it seems to make sense to grow grasses from seed, given that you can easily buy hundreds (or even…
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How Bamboos Exploited Pandas
Pandas are iconic animals that are well known and beloved around the world. They are bears from the family Ursidae, and are endemic to China. But unlike the other members of the taxon, they subsist mainly on bamboo shoots and leaves, even though their teeth and digestive systems are geared towards a meat-eating (carnivorous) diet.…
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Delineating Grassland Evolution Using Phytoliths
I have a strong fascination with the evolution of grasslands, and this recent talk by Dr. Caroline A E Strömberg is pretty much the best and most comprehensive video about that subject. If you are at all a scholar of grasses, then this is one video you should not miss. It is fairly long, but…
Sejarah Poaceae (Volume 2)
The Story of Grasses – Grasslands and Grassy Open Ecosystems