Alastair Culham
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thebotanist.bsky.social
Alastair Culham
@thebotanist.bsky.social
270 followers 150 following 91 posts
Life through botany goggles. Botany, phylogeny, plants, horticulture. Enjoys baking. Has a pet red eared terrapin.
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thebotanist.bsky.social
Last week, I met Hydrolea spinosa (photo) at Cambridge Botanic Garden. Tomorrow, I'll hear a talk on taxonomy of Hydroleaceae at Edinburgh Botanic Garden. The family has 1 genus & 11 species. Part of Solanales. This species doesn't even have its own Wikipedia page :(
@cubotanicgarden.bsky.social
Bright purple/blue flower with five petals and prominent stamens arising from herb with ovate hairy leaves.
August 27, 2025 at 8:56 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
A nail biting Botanical University Challenge semi-final between Reading and Plymouth. Plymouth won on the fourth tiebreak question. Congratulations Plymouth!
August 20, 2025 at 1:49 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Botanical University Challenge Semi final 1 is about to start.
www.youtube.com/live/bX_sdw1...
Follow luve on You Tube
#Botany #Plants
Audience for BUC in Sainsbury Centre Lecture theatre.
August 20, 2025 at 12:29 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Drimia/Squilla coming in to flower in Gozo. It amazes me how plants can invest such energy into flowering in the peak dry season. #geophyte #Asparagaceae #Bulb
August 13, 2025 at 2:27 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Visited Comino today. Pancratium maritimum in bloom. My first ever experience of a rubbish bin dedicated to waste pineapples. Instagram craze of pineapple based cocktails on Comino, Blue Lagoon. No idea why. There is a somewhat whimsical 'history' of the craze here lovinmalta.com/opinion/sati...
A plastic wheelie bin with label 'Kindly dispose pineapple here'. Sea daffodil flowers.
August 12, 2025 at 8:08 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
As a long-time Cyclamen researcher, this is my first encounter with a cheese named Cyclamen! Looking forward to tasting it!
August 7, 2025 at 4:07 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
What happens when you photograph a plant next to a mooring bollard and ask AI to identify it? You get told you've photographed a mushroom. What i was siming for was Carduus tenuiflorus. Context is crucial.
Carduus tenuiflorus flowering next to a white painted metal bollard.
July 8, 2025 at 6:17 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Peat free cultivation of Sarracenia - trials at Royal Horticultural Society, Wisley. Seen on Saturday. It looks as if Schnell's 1970s recommendation to use Sphagnum still holds true!
October 15, 2024 at 6:50 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Currently at #MonocotsVII in San Jose, Costa Rica. Had nearly a whole day of mycoheterotrophs - Thismia & Corallorhiza among others.
Garden in front of National Convention Center with palms, plumeria, cycads and more. Me in front of giant bamboo plant. Conference hall at break time with coffee urns, food and lots of botanists milling around. Tom Givnish opening Monocots VII at wooden lecturn with conference banner.
March 12, 2024 at 11:51 AM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Congratulations to Tomos Jones, University of Reading, Biology for passing his PhD on gardens as a source of invasive plants. #gardenescapers #invasives
@herbarium.bsky.social @drmgoeswild.bsky.social
Four smiling adults standing in a building next to a parlour palm.
February 17, 2024 at 10:22 AM
thebotanist.bsky.social
It's National Houseplant Appreciation Day. This Cymbidium is in flower in my conservatory after a summer in the garden. I'll make sure I appreciate it!
@drmgoeswild.bsky.social
Cymbidium with spray of green flowers, each with lip of cream with red flecks.
January 10, 2024 at 2:29 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
University of Reading is lucky enough to have an original Herefordshire Pomona. The 'Carrion Apple' pictured here was so called because the oldest tree was used to hang meat for dogs. Also known as 'Kempley Red' which sounds rather nicer. 🙂🌱🌿 @konyveskalman.bsky.social
Open pages of a book showing colour plates of apples on the left and text about the carrion apple on the right.
November 20, 2023 at 6:08 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
I've got a research interest in Cyclamen so was intrigued to see this Djix cultivar in a garden centre this morning. The petals stick out rather than being reflexed giving an attractive contrast between petals and sepals. schoneveld-breeding.com/en/on-displa... 🌱 #Botany
Cyclamen with exclusive DJIX label. Pink-red cyclamen petals contrasting with broad white sepals. Individual flower of Cyclamen DJIX showing alternating white sepals and pink petals.
November 18, 2023 at 11:49 AM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Coelogyne trinervis is flowering in my greenhouse. The smell has the amine odour of chestnut flowers. Not one to bring in to the house! 🌱 #Botany #orchid
Green and cream outer tepals of this orchid flower with a brown labellum. The floral scent had been described as both strong and seminiferous.
November 12, 2023 at 4:26 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Cyclamen confusum (Grey-Wilson) Culham, Jope, P.Moore- I've seen this in cultivation, DNA sequenced it but this week was the first time in the wild. powo.science.kew.org/taxon/urn:ls...
Sirikari Gorge maps.app.goo.gl/Da3Pt46JYedL...
Deep green shiny heart shaped leaf with toothed edges and silver mottling. Deep green shiny heart shaped leaf with toothed edges and silver mottling. Very pale pink flower with deep pink patched between auricles. Very pale pink flower with deep pink patches extending up narrow petals between auricles.
November 9, 2023 at 8:14 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Cyclamen graecum leaves today in Crete. Leaves from just one population! 🌱 The flowers are fairly uniform in mid to light pink.
Dark green heart shaped leaves with prominent silver veins. Dark green heart shaped leaves with silver heart in centre. Mid green leaves with dark green centre. Very dark green leaf edge with silver-white centre.
November 7, 2023 at 7:49 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
#Wildflowerhour still in Crete - so much to report! Adiantum capillus-veneris, Ephedra foeminea, Crithmum maritimum, Phoenix theophrasti.
🌱
Fern with black rachis and light green pinnae. Thin green stems and bright pink fruit. Yellow fruit on compound umbels emerging from rock crevice. Palm trees with globular heads of fronds
November 5, 2023 at 8:42 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
#wildflowerhour in Crete this week. Narcissus deficiens, Prospero autumnale, Cyclamen graecum subsp. candicum, Biarum davisii. All seen in flower today.
Collections for @herbarium.bsky.social. 🌱🌿
White flower with six elliptic-ovate tepals and central orange corona. Small cluster of lilac flowers with deep purple anthers. White flowers with reflexed petals and deep pink petal bases. Tubular creamy-brown spathe surrounding dark brown spadix.
November 5, 2023 at 8:06 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Spectacular views while botanising in Zaros gorge & Rouvas forest today. On the way up everyone we passed said "it's really windy up there." It was!
Crete has so much scenery they've had to fold the landscape to fit it all in😁
🌱🌿 #botany
Spectacular view between pine trees down valley to Zaros and the mountains beyond. Large boulders about head height with occasional red paint marks to indicate the path. Wooden bridge over gorge. Looking along the gorge at the winding path.
November 4, 2023 at 5:29 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Prospero autumnale agg. ✅
Muscari comosum (Leopoldia comosa)✅
Drimia maritima ✅
Sterbergia lutea subsp. lutea ✅
Cyclamen creticum ❎ - it's spring flowering but hoping for leaves.
Above Zaros lake, Crete.
🌱🌿 #botany
Fieldwork for @herbarium.bsky.social
Small six tepalled flower in light lilac Dry seedheads on brown stalk against limestone rock. Tall dry spike of brown seed pods on long bare stem. Bright butter yellow flowers against white limestone.
November 4, 2023 at 5:17 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Did the olive trunk inspire the ancient pillar design? Near the Temple of Apollo, Gortina. #Fieldwork #Botany 🌱
Drimia maritima in plenty around here. @herbarium.bsky.social
Ancient olive with spirally twisted trunk. Stone column carved with spiral pattern. Numerous stems of Drimia in fruit.
November 3, 2023 at 7:08 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Today's botanical treats in Crete. Drimia numidica, Muscari comosum (Leopoldia comosa), Prospero autumnale agg. X2
Part of research @herbarium.bsky.social on climate change and Mediterranean plant evolution.
@konyveskalman.bsky.social
Tight clusters of white flowers on pink stems. Dry brown seedhead on rocky ground. Pale pink flowers on slender stem. Pale blue flowers on slender stem.
November 2, 2023 at 7:19 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
As a native of Essex, I am amazed to meet this rather specialist washing powder for the first time in Crete. 😂
Bright pink box of ESSEX touch washing powder.
November 2, 2023 at 3:24 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Erica manipuliflora, Prospero autumnale, Cistus creticus, Phoenix theophrasti all seen today. #Crete #Botany 🌱🌿
@herbarium.bsky.social @konyveskalman.bsky.social
Erica with numerous small pink flowers with reflexed petal lobes. Pale lilac flower against brown mossy soil. Five rumpled pale pink petals surrounding yellow centre of flower. Hundreds of small orange fruit hang from Palm.
November 1, 2023 at 8:41 PM
thebotanist.bsky.social
Drimia, Sterbergia, Prospero and Cyclamen featured as today's main geophytes in central Crete today. Collecting for
@herbarium.bsky.social 🌿🌱
Contorted infructescence arising from large bulb growing in brown scrubby vegetation. A cluster of bright yellow six tepalled flowers. Lilac flowers on slender stem. Dense cluster of pink Cyclamen flowers from leaf litter.
October 31, 2023 at 9:20 PM