To do our part in halting the spread of COVID-19, the Manitoba Museum is temporarily closed to the public until further notice.
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One of the most impressive plant specimens at the Manitoba Museum is a huge, preserved grass that shows the entire root system. I think the reason everybody likes this specimen is that it provides a perspective that no one ever has: what a plant actually looks like under the ground. There was just one problem with that grass: it’s not actually a native species. It’s a Eurasian species called Crested…
I recently read that, thanks to Covid-19, there’s been a run on Christmas trees because so many people are staying home for the holidays this year. In a world that suffers from plant blindness (i.e. an inability to see the trees for the forest), “Christmas trees”, are among the most well-known “species” of plant. Except that “Christmas tree” is not actually A species; it is ANY kind of coniferous (i.e….
Soil is sometimes called “dirt”, as if it is something completely devoid of value. But without healthy soil, there would be no food, and without food, humans are doomed. We owe this thin layer of life, a respect far exceeding what we typically show it. Soil consists, not just of sand, silt and clay, but organic matter from plants, fungi and animals, as well as a diverse community of soil…
Closed Gentian (Gentiana andrewsii) was always a puzzle to me. When I first saw a picture of it in a field guide, I assumed that the photographer had simply taken the picture before the petals fully opened up. It was many years before I finally figured out what this plant’s deal was. Back in 2004, while doing field work out at the Tall Grass Prairie Preserve, I had to walk…
A week ago I posted a blog about a rare plant that I had been searching for in the West Hawk Lake area: climbing fumitory. Since then I’ve had several people ask me how to tell this plant (shown in in the picture above) apart from other similar species. In Manitoba there are only five species in the fumitory family and they are fairly easy to tell apart: two are…
Eighty years ago, Manitoba botanist Charles W. Lowe collected a plant from the West Hawk Lake area, not realizing that it would be the last time anyone would collect it in this province again. This June, I embarked upon a journey to see if that elusive plant was still hiding somewhere in Whiteshell Provincial Park. My scholarly journey commenced when I began working on a revised Flora of Manitoba; a…
We share our world with billions of other organisms and they play a crucial role in our survival, providing the ecosystem services that keep us alive: making oxygen for us to breathe, filtering toxins from our water, and providing shade for us and our homes to name a few benefits. With so many cultural events being cancelled this year due to Covid-19, you may be planning on spending some time…
It is pretty well known that plants differ from animals due to their ability to make their own food using just carbon dioxide, water and sunlight through a process called photosynthesis. But some plants are a bit lazy and figured “why should I make my own food like a sucker when I can just steal some from my neighbor?” Thus, the strategy of plant parasitism was born. The secret to…
Canada’s trees have developed some resistance to native diseases and insect pests. However, climate change has been facilitating more forest damage. For example, the native Mountain Pine Beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae) used to be held in check because it was killed by extremely cold winter temperatures, which occur less frequently now than they used to. Additionally, in the last 125 years, the importation of live trees and untreated wood from other…
We humans tend to think that diseases affect only animals but plants suffer from them as well. Diseases are caused by microscopic animals (like parasitic worms), fungi, bacteria and viruses and they affect animals, plants, fungi and even some species of bacteria (viruses that infect bacteria are called bacteriophages). But it’s not just microorganisms that parasitize species; larger organisms do too. Some fungi are parasites of other fungi and some…
The Manitoba Museum is located on Treaty 1 land, and the homeland of the Métis Nation. These lands, occupied for thousands of years, are the traditional territories of the Anishinaabeg, Ininiwak, and Nakota Nations. The Museum is committed to collaborating with all Indigenous peoples of this province including the Dakota, Anishininiwak, Dene, and Inuit.
We acknowledge the harms of the past, are committed to improving relationships in the spirit of reconciliation, and appreciate the opportunity to live and learn on these traditional lands in mutual respect.
Manitoba Museum is accredited by Imagine Canada for excellence in non-profit accountability, transparency and governance.
