Plants of Skye, Raasay & The Small Isles

Even though I am away from home at present, the project continues! John and Jean have had  a go at a 1 km square south of Bracadale which forms part of a tetrad with no previous records  and achieved a creditable 121 records – pretty good for a limited area in mid-September.

Meanwhile Sarah has confirmed  the Utricularia from the last Skye Botany Group meeting as U. stygia (Nordic Bladderwort) by microscopic examination of the quadrifid hairs in the bladders:

Utricularia stygia quadrifid hairs. Photo S. Longrigg

I have been having a look at malformed plantains and it turns out that this genus is prone to floral deviations from the norm, though I have not found reference to one quite the same as Steve’s. The 1868 book Vegetable Teratology by Maxwell T. Masters is available as a free e-book from Project Gutenberg and in this the author gives a classification of five types of malformation affecting the inflorescence in Plantago according to Schlechtendal in 1857. However, the only time P. maritima is mentioned it is the context of a form bearing additional spikes in the axils of the bracts.

“Rose Plantain” is a form of P. major that is similar to our Skye plant in that it has many leafy bracts where one would expect an inflorescence. It looks quite different as the leaves of this species are so broad. It has been known in the UK since medieval times and is described in John Gerard’s Herball or General Historie of Plants, published in 1597.

Elizabethan John Parkinson wrote Paradisi in Sole Paradisus Terrestris (1629): “The Rose Plantaine hath been long in England”.

It obviously breeds true and one can buy seeds on the internet where there are also many images of this strange-looking plant e.g. here.

Maybe Steve should cultivate his find and make a fortune?

Steve Terry found this by the roadside at Dunan:

Montrous Plantago maritima

The inflorescences have been replaced by whorls of leaves. I haven’t had time to research this yet but many years ago I had  a malformed Plantago lanceolata that I sent to someone in Dublin who had a special interest in such things. Must try to check back and see whether he is still active.

There were two main objectives today:

• Re-find the 1983 record for Potamogeton crispus (Curled Pondweed) in Loch Dubhar-sgoth, the only localised record for this species in the vice-county.
• Fill in an apparently missing tetrad for Berula erecta (Lesser Water-parsnip) – known along the River Brogaig both upstream and downstream of NG46T.

Both of these were achieved:

Potamogeton crispus

Berula erecta

As well as P. crispus in 1983, Loch Dubhar-sgoth had P. gramineus (Various-leaved Pondweed) recorded in 1970. Today, as well as both of these (though I have yet to check a specimen of the latter to make sure it is not Potamogeton x nitens (P. gramineus x perfoliatus)), I found P. berchtoldii (Small Pondweed) and P. perfoliatus (Perfoliate Pondweed). Quite a pondweed zoo.

Loch Corcasgil a little to the north had Potamogeton natans (Broad-leaved Pondweed) and P. polygonifolius (Bog Pondweed) only recorded in the past and that was how it looks today.

Loch Cleap had lots of standard Sparganium angustifolium (Floating Bur-reed) but also some with much broader leaves and inflorescence characters bordering on S. emersum (Unbranched Bur-reed) – see below!

Sparganium

LATER:

Carl has sorted me out: It is Mentha requienii (Corsican Mint). Just as I had sorted out an image of the flower, too:

This is an introduction/garden escape but I suspect it is a very long way from Balachuirn, where this is growing, to the nearest garden with it in.  It is also a considerable extension to its range, the farthest accepted record up the west coast is the Loch Glashan area of Argyllshire where Carl found it in 2009 and there is a slightly more northerly record from near Arbroath in 1984.

Does anybody know what this is, please?  The leaves are up to 3 mm, the flowers about 1.5 mm across with 4 petals and, I think, 4 stamens.  It is rooting at the nodes and growing on dry ground. It has (relatively) long white hairs on the upper leaf surface and lots of hairs on the sepals.

(You can click on the images to get a better view.)

Thanks for any help you can give….  One thing is for sure, it is new to Raasay!