In Chicago, of all places

I have heard it said, and I believe it:

The tropical rainforest is important and we should teach its conservation. But it is equally important for an American child to love and value the forest just beyond his own backyard, that he or She may mature into a grown-up who cares.

Only today I have learned of a tiny, unique little flower, believed extinct. In a purely material sense, who knows what pharmaceuticals might have been extracted from it for the benefit of humankind? Thismia apparently had a relationship with local soil fungi. Perhaps it produced botanical chemicals to ward off other fungi or bacteria.

Who knows what a study of its DNA and habitat might have added to the discussion of continental drift, and how it came to be so far from its only living relatives in Australia.

You see, this little flower, thismia, wasn't found on some pristine Montana prairie, not even in a deep Smoky Mountains forest. It was found, in 1916, in a wetland in ...

... Chicago.

And since the initial report by a sharp-eyed scientist, it has never been seen again. And in the years following, someone smothered the site in fill dirt. And no one really cared, because it was Chicago after all, a city, not some wild wilderness. And so we may never know its story.

http://chicagowildernessmag.org/issues/summer2004/thismia.html

A dimunitive beauty

When A.R. and I went hiking the other day, I was excited to find one of my old-time woodland neighbors in bloom. It only grows in two places that I know of in the entire forest behind my house. She wanted to pick it but I had to help Her understand that this flower is too scarce to do that.

The little beauty is called Chimaphila maculata (Spotted wintergreen.)

Water Willow

I was so excited this Memorial Day when, down at a certain wetland with my Sweetie, I discovered Water Willow in bloom.I have searched for this plant for years, ever since first coming across it in a distant location where I have not seen it since.

It is of course not related to true willows, which don't have flowers like this. It's in the acanthus family, whose more typical members are thorny residents in dry areas. Acanthus leaves show up on a lot of ancient Greek art, for example.

The genus name for water willow, justicia, comes from James Justice, an 18th century Scottish botanist. I wonder if he choose it in a proud moment of discovery or whether it was homage paid by an admirer of his work. Things to research, things to research.

I trimmed off a stem and am now trying to root it in a bucket of water for eventual transplant into the bog garden that I hope to build someday in place of the crumbling deck in my backyard. I'm just not a sit-on-the-deck kind of guy.

Now I have a new quest: to find the only other representative of this family that is native to my area: the so-called wild petunia, ruellia spp. Once again, it is no relation to actual petunias, which are in the potent nightshade family.

Coffee, cells and Nighty-night

How coffee (caffeine) actually works on the cellular level to keep you awake:

http://www.sfn.org/index.cfm?pagename=brainBriefings_adenosineAndSleep

"Scientists once believed that the peppy chemical caffeine induced its effects by blocking the same sedating mechanisms that tranquilizers like Valium enhanced. But in 1981, researchers found that caffeine's kick stemmed from its relationship to the chemical adenosine.

Normally, adenosine attaches to special receiving areas on cells, or receptors, and sets off distinct actions. Studies of rats revealed, however, that caffeine stonewalls these receptors, blocks adenosine from carrying out its job, and as a result induces alertness. This suggested that adenosine plays a role in sleep. Now increasing evidence is confirming that, indeed, adenosine is an important "fatigue factor.""

Adenosine is a broken-down piece of a bigger molecule abbreviated as ATP. ATP is what gives us energy. Apparently, adenosine accumulates as you are awake and active, attaches to your cells and cues sleepiness.

So it's like the cellular equivalent of dirt accumulating on your car suggesting strongly to you that you ought to run it through the car wash. Or of waste products accumulating in your bladder, signifying with more urgency each minute that you really ought to take a trip to the restroom.

A whole lot is going on inside of you as you go about your daily business -- and as you sip that hot bean juice to try to chase off the Sandman!

I'm of course curious as to what plants use the caffeine alkaloid for, why they evolved it, since of course they don't need to worry about staying awake.