The House(s) of Fran_mart

One change we have noted is that speed limits throughout Mallacoota have dropped to 50kph.  Apparently the is an edict of VIC Roads.  In most places it is sensible but I'm sure it is dogma, not as a result of an increase in accidents.  On which subject, in 2016 a cyclist failed to take the bend at the bottom of  'our' road and went headfirst over a 2m high cliff.  Bad head injury and off in a helicopter.  No idea what happened to her (note from the future: the poor lady succumbed to her injuries).. On a more pleasant note I glanced at eBird to see what has been spotted locally since we last visited and find that for several hotspots in the Mallacoota area I am the top of the list for species seen.  Fame at last, although I am sure its simply a function of number of visits not skill at birding. The surprise overnight (2-3 February) was a downpour (of unknown quantity of rain as I hadn't emptied the gauge) about 2am which caused the gutter above the ...

I had been contemplating a post about taxonomy for some time.  Then I received an email message about orchids which included: " Don't get too hung up with the scientific names which seem to be in a constant state of change. Petalochilus is back to being Caladenia."  One issue is how does one know this change has taken place?   Rumours have been around for some time that one of the authors of the last major change - adopted in the ACT at least - had changed his mind, but the Council of Heads of Australian Herbaria (CHAH) had been unable to agree on either the correctness of the previous change or the backstepping.  I  posted a somewhat terse view on this . A number of people have spoken to me, agreeing that the current state of affairs is rather woeful.  I also got a blog-comment from my friend Ian Fraser commenting (inter alia) that "It's not as if the distin ctions between genera and subgenera are facts of nature - such things are ultimately hum...

This post is primarily about a technical talk given to the Plant Science group of the Friends of the ANBG .  I found it an engrossing talk and will try to summarise it here for the benefit of others. On arrival we were given yellow ribbons in recognition of it being Wattle Day. The background story is that the City of Hiroshima, Japan has a Wattle Appreciation Society, reflecting a wattle being the first blossom seen after the atom bombing of the city.  Every 1 September since 1992 they have provided 1000 ribbons to the Gardens.  They were originally made by children at an orphanage but are now made in primary schools.  The media release says to put the ribbon on a favourite tree so here it is on our huge Yellow Box ( Eucalyptus meliodora ). In getting to the talk, it is crucial to note that while the presenter of the talk was Professor Rod Peakall from the   ANU College of Medicine, Biology and Environment what follows is my interpretation of his poin...