Episodes

  • Texas' Rarest Plant, Caliche Gardens & Crested Peyote

    Texas' Rarest Plant, Caliche Gardens & Crested Peyote
    Sep 20 2024
    In this episode we talk about Paronychia congesta, one of Texas' Rarest Plants, which grows on Caliche barrens in Jim Hogg County, as well as Caliche blazing stars, the Crested Peyote of West Texas, planting native plant gardens at Amada's House in Mirando City,and plenty more.
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    1 hr and 32 mins
  • Lycophytes, Quillworts & the "Great Dying"

    Lycophytes, Quillworts & the "Great Dying"
    Sep 16 2024
    I became fixated on lycophytes because of some of the cool desert-dwelling members of the genus Selaginella, not to mention the utterly weird "clubmosses" that thrive in places as disparate as Northern Wisconsin and the slopes of volcanoes in New Zealand, but in this episode botanist Jeff Benca tells us about his work with relatives of the genus Isoetes ("Quillworts") and how their 250 million year old relatives might have been able to survive the biggest extinction in Earth's history, otherwise known as the Permian Extinction or "The Great Dying".
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    2 hrs and 37 mins
  • West Texas Pine Harvest and Alternation of Generations

    West Texas Pine Harvest and Alternation of Generations
    Sep 13 2024
    A rant about West Texas Pines and the sand blazing star. At the 40 minute mark we begin our dive into the convoluted, confusing but utterly cool phenomenon of Alternation of Generations we talk mostly about Bryophytes (mosses and liverworts) and Lycophytes ("spikemosses" and "clubmosses"), and the ferns, but not gymnosperms or angiosperms). This turns into more of a "lesson" on the subject than a podcast episode.

    Key terms to remember :

    Gametophyte (haploid), Sporophyte (diploid)
    Haploid - 1 set of chromosomes aka 1 copy of the genome
    Diploid - 2 sets of chromosomes aka 2 copies of the genome (one as a backup copy)
    Meiosis (takes a diploid cell and produces haploid daughter cells, two of which later come together to form a diploid zygote/sporophyte)
    Mitosis (Cell divides and produces cells identical to whatever the parent cell was, whether that parent cell was haploid or diploid. Mitosis doesn't reduce the chromosome number by half). Meiosis is synonymous with sex/reproduction/the production of haploid cells).

    Evolutionary lineages referenced in this episode and their phylogenetic classification:

    Bryophytes (An informal paraphyletic classification used to refer to the non-vascular Phyla Anthocerotophyta (hornworts), Marchantiophyta (liverworts), and Bryophyta (mosses)

    Lycophytes : Class Lycopodiopsida, contains 3 orders: Lycopodiales (1 Family : Lycopodiaceae; 3 Subfamilies : Huperzioideae, Lycopodielloideae, Lycopoideae), Selaginellales (1 family : Selaginellaceae), & Isoetales (1 family : Isoetaceae).

    Ferns : Class Polypodiopsida.
    Contains 4 Subclasses : Equisetidae (Horsetails), Marattiadae (Marratioid Bastards including Angiopteris evecta with 20' long fronds), Ophioglossidae (Whisk Ferns, Grape Ferns, Moonworts), and Polypodiidae (Leptosporangiate Ferns, aka the "classic" ferns including the majority of what people think of when they think of ferns including Maidenhairs, Cinnamon Ferns, Sensitive Ferns, Filmy Ferns, Forked Ferns, Cheilanthoid "Desert" Ferns, Mosquito Ferns, Tree Ferns, Aspleniums, etc.


    THUMBNAIL : Archegoniophore (haploid) and Non-photosynthetic Sporophyte (Diploid) of the Baja California liverwort Asterella palmeri, photo by Ken-Ichi Ueda
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    1 hr and 45 mins
  • A Conversation with Dan Hosage

    A Conversation with Dan Hosage
    Sep 7 2024
    A conversation with Chemist, Genius, Botanist,, Propagator, & Madman Dan Hosage about Texas Native Plants, Texas History, and more.
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    3 hrs and 6 mins
  • Convincing Mice to Vote for Cats

    Convincing Mice to Vote for Cats
    Aug 30 2024
    NON-BOTANY PODCAST! This week's podcast is a conversation with my friend Jay Lesoleil, political anthropologist and half the means behind the "Fucking Cancelled" podcast about right-wing populism, the failures of the American left, identitarianism, and how to build a non-insane American working class left.
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    1 hr and 9 mins
  • Oaks Are the Beasts of An Ecosystem! A Discussion with Dr. Andrew Hipp

    Oaks Are the Beasts of An Ecosystem! A Discussion with Dr. Andrew Hipp
    Aug 22 2024
    Andrew Hipp is the director of the herbarium and Senior Sciensist and Researcher in Plant Systematics at Morton Arboretum in Chicago.

    This is one of the most fun and inspiring conversations I've had in a while, and it's about one of the most ecologically important genera of plants in the Northern Hemisphere : THE OAKS (genus Quercus).

    In this episode we talk about the 13,000 year old Palmer's Oak in the California Desert, what the hell "Delayed Fertilization" is (hint: it's not common but it's ubiquitous in all members of genus Quercus), Oak Evolution, we go in depth explaining oak pollination and flower morphology and how acorns develop and disperse, how acorns can stand get a bite taken out of them by a squirrel and still germinate, and what overall f*cking beasts of organisms oak tree and scrub oaks are. We also talk about the future of oaks, how oaks will deal with climate change, how oaks dealt with the incredibly hot temperatures during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), why there's so much oak diversity in Mexico, the multitude of ecological services oaks provide and the numerous ecological relationships oaks foster within a plant community, landscape and regional setting. This was a fun conversation and massively enlightening.

    Pre-Order Andrew's Book at :

    https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/O/bo236998258.html

    Oak Taxonomic Tree (as inferred from molecular genomic data)

    Oak Subgenus Cerris : Eurasia
    Oak Subgenus Quercus : North America

    Subgenus Quercus, section Lobatae (Red Oaks)

    Subgenus Quercus section Quercus
    Subgenus Quercus section Virentes
    Subgenus Quercus section Ponticae
    Subgenus Quercus section Protobalanus
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    1 hr and 27 mins
  • Aquatic Botany with Casey Williams

    Aquatic Botany with Casey Williams
    Aug 14 2024
    Casey Williams is an botanist and plant ecologist specializing in aquatic plants - both plants that grow completely submerged and which can emerge above the water surface. In this episode, we discuss :

    -the stresses facing plants that grow underwater,
    -being limited by CO2 availability instead of water availability,
    -the endangered Texas Wild Rice,
    -how limestone geology influences aquatic plant growth by making CO2 more abundant,
    -utilizing aquatic plants and the fungi that grow on them for bioremediation and treating sewage at the local shitplant
    -how some aquatic plants have adapted to a paucity of dissolved carbon dioxide by supplementing with bicarbonate,
    -aquatic plants in deserts, and
    -how one plant in particular has utilized an evolutionary strategy more frequently employed by desert plants (CAM) as a way to cope with fluctuations in CO2 availability.

    Books referenced which can be downloaded off libgen.is :

    Wetland Plants by Cronk
    Aquatic Photosynthesis by Falkowski
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    2 hrs and 36 mins
  • Rustbelt Tour Recap & Ouachita Orogeny

    Rustbelt Tour Recap & Ouachita Orogeny
    Aug 6 2024
    Vernonia lettermannii and other cool plants of Western Arkansas Novaculite, Ouachita Mountain Orogeny, Chert Glades of Western Missouri, the most obnoxious cicada species in the world, Detroit Rustic, Pittsburgh Museums, Shared Mountain Ranges of Appalachia and Morocco from the times of Pangaea, Northern Pennsylvania Glaciation, and more.
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    2 hrs and 1 min