Friday, February 10, 2012

Wildflower? weed?....

While I'm on 'flowers', I can't resist posting the following sequence, spotted on the roadside near Pleasant Point, South Canterbury. None (of the four) of us was sure what plant this is. Wildflower or weed, it was delicately beautiful. Strawberry chocolate fish to the first person who can identify...






11 comments:

  1. Looks like Queen Anne's Lace to me.

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  2. Looks to me like a strain of Yarrow .. and along Debs line also like a diamante broach :)

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  3. Oooh, I don't think it's yarrow PG. It looks like it from a distance but up close it's not as tough as yarrow. Though a friend on the day also thought yarrow. I thought of Queen Anne's Lace when I first saw it Deb though it looks different in the 'bud' to the QAL that I have grown in the past. Suppose I should just google it. Cause I need to get the choc fish recipient right!

    Diamante broach - yes, that's it exactly :-)

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  4. I thought it looked like carrot flower heads. Then I googled Queen Anne's Lace as have never heard of it and its other name is wild carrot. I think Deb is right :) Can chocolate fish swim as far as America, or do they get eaten in customs? :)

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  5. I think "diamante broach" should get the chocolate fish! That he even knew the term! I'm trying to imagine Moe Miller coming up with such a poetic response, and it's not computing :-)

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  6. Ah - I didn't know that Queen Anne's Lace was also wild carrot. Now that makes sense of what we saw. Methinks it's choc fish all round (with maybe a bonus - ie choc fish+ - for diamante). I'll need an address Deb!

    Thank you all.

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  7. Yay to choc fish hehehe. Can you email me your address too please Deb as we found a wee something at Xmas-time that we would love to send you.

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  8. Wild carrot, Daucus carota. Becoming increasingly common in Canterbury and Otago, especially on roadsides. Even saw it in rural Auckland a few weeks ago. If you snap off the root and smell it, it is unmistakably carrot, even though the rootstock is white and looks very different. Don't try eating it, the wild form is not nice. The arrival of this plant destroyed the Canterbury carrot seed industry as it crossed with the cultivated forms in the fields. The way the flowering heads curl inwards as it comes into flower distinguishes it from other white-flowered species with umbels such as bullwort, hemlock etc.

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  9. AND .. Thankyou for the Chocolate Fish too !! Lovely yummy ;O}}>

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  10. Brilliant!! Thanks PG. I'll copy this and pass on to the others who were on that trip - they will be interested.

    I didn't know Canterbury ever had a carrot seed industry!

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