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15.4.07

"First Flower"

I was watching PBS last night and saw a commercial for a new documentary called First Flower. It grabbed my attention because of all the floral imagery and some time-lapse photography of blooms and the voice over spoke of discovering the origins of flowers.

"...Flowers have long been at the center of human life. They grace our gardens, brighten our homes, express our gratitude, and even reveal the secrets of our hearts. But they are also essential to human survival. Flowering plants—which include not just our favorite roses, daffodils, and orchids but also wheat, rice, and corn—provide food and medicine and drive national economies. Yet for all our love and need of flowers, until recently, the basic questions about how flowers evolved into the most important and prolific of plants have confounded scientists. In the 19th century, Charles Darwin himself called the dazzling variety of flowers "an abominable mystery," and the puzzle of how flowers came to make up 95 percent of all plants on Earth continues today..."

There is also a companion website for the program with added features and videos. The companion site has a cool feature where you can test yours skills of matching up a flower and pollinator, can you match all seven flowers and pollinators?


First Flower-Tuesday, April 17 at 8pm

12 comments:

  1. Very educational, Mr. Brown Thumb! And yet another picture up top? Or am I just having more failing memory (always a possibility!)? Love it! Makes me want to garden! Go away rain! I guess I'll have to go ahead and...finally...start some seeds! Lol!

    P.S. If it is a case of poor memory...be kind to me!

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  2. Anonymous4:35 PM

    I have always believed that flowers play an essential role in our lives, for one thing they attract pollinators which is a vital step in food production. They are also beautiful. This was a good read, thanks.

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  3. I missed just one... I wasn't sure whether the night-blooming orchid would be pollinated by the sphinx moth or the fruit bat, and I picked the wrong nocturnal creature first. Great quiz, though!

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  4. @ gotta garden

    Glad you liked it. The flowers and plants in the header are suppose to rotate automatically between a few different pictures when the page is refreshed. :)

    @ Bob,

    Very true. Glad you found it interesting.

    @ BSG the one that mixed me up with the common blue violet. I thought it was a trick question. :)

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  5. Anonymous6:24 PM

    Thanks for this! I will set my Tevo! :)

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  6. Loved the pick-a-pollinator game. I missed one - the violets. Now I'll have to look more closely to see those self-pollinating buds!

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  7. Thank you for letting us know about the NOVA program, Mr Brown Thumb... it sounds really good.

    Also, thanks for the comment on my blog. But please don't worry that I was unhappy with the color of the clematis - I just wanted a cheap clematis for an experiment, to see if I could grow one in a deck container, and that one was a bargain table plant calling out "Rescue Me!" The dark purple was a pleasant surprise. I'm sorry yours was disappointing.

    Annie at the Transplantable Rose

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  8. Chicago Walgreens stores have a cupon this week: 10 packs of seeds for $1.00

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  9. Hector thanks for the heads up.

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  10. mrbrownthumb... I love the new header on your blog. Great photo AND great graphic!

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  11. I saw the program last night. What a wonderful presentation. I'm glad you blogged about it. Wasn't it fascinating to see how many kinds of plants there were in just a few meters of space in the Guang dong province? And to think most of the ornamentals we have in our gardens came from there! A very special place indeed.

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  12. Hi Annie, Thanks for stopping by glad you like the pics.

    Ki, I recorded it and watched part of it late last night before I fell asleep. My mouth was watering during that early scene where the plant hunter got out of his car and found all those plants in one spot right along the road. I'll have to finish watching it tonight. Thanks for stopping by.

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