214 Fun Facts About Flower

What is the big yellow "flower" of a sunflower, botanically speaking?

Each 'petal' is a sterile ray floret and every seed in the centre comes from its own disc floret, so one head is really hundreds of flowers.

Mature sunflower heads lock in place facing which direction?

Mature heads lock facing east: the sunrise warms them quickly, and a 2016 study found east-facing heads drew far more pollinator visits than heads turned to face west.

The sunflower is the national flower of which country?

The sunflower is Ukraine's national flower; Ukraine and Russia together grow roughly half of the world's sunflower seeds.

Which US state has the sunflower as its official state flower?

Kansas adopted the wild native sunflower as its state flower in 1903 and is nicknamed the Sunflower State.

Botanically, what kind of fruit is a single sunflower 'seed' in its striped shell?

A sunflower 'seed' is an achene, a dry one-seeded fruit whose hard shell is the fruit wall; the edible kernel inside is the true seed.

Sunflower spiral counts like 34 and 55, or 89 and 144, are consecutive numbers from which sequence?

Those are consecutive Fibonacci numbers: each floret sits about 137.5 degrees, the golden angle, round from the last, which packs seeds tightly and yields Fibonacci spiral counts.

Van Gogh painted his Arles sunflower still lifes in 1888 to decorate a bedroom for which fellow painter?

Van Gogh painted the Arles vase sunflowers in August 1888 to decorate the Yellow House room for Paul Gauguin, who arrived that October; an earlier 1887 Paris series shows cut flowers on the ground.

After the Chernobyl disaster, sunflowers were floated on a contaminated pond for what purpose?

The technique is called phytoremediation, and the same plant has been used to soak up lead from polluted soils.

Rafflesia arnoldii, the largest single flower on Earth at up to a metre across, grows in the rainforests of which two islands?

Sumatra and Borneo host a bloom that smells of rotting meat, which is exactly what its fly pollinators are looking for.

Rafflesia has no leaves, stems or roots of its own. How does it survive?

It has no chlorophyll either, so it steals everything it needs from the vine and only shows itself when a bud bursts out to bloom.

A single Rafflesia arnoldii bloom can weigh up to roughly how much?

The heaviest Rafflesia arnoldii blooms reach about 11 kg (24 lb); the metre-wide flower lasts only a few days before collapsing into a black slimy mess.

Who presented the 1995 TV series for which the name 'titan arum' was reportedly coined?

David Attenborough coined 'titan arum' for The Private Life of Plants (1995), judging the Latin Amorphophallus titanum, 'giant misshapen phallus', unfit to say on air.

What unusual thing does a blooming titan arum's spadix do to spread its rotting-flesh smell?

The warmth helps volatilise the stench and draws in carrion insects looking for a corpse to lay their eggs in.

Dutch tulip mania collapsed dramatically in February of which year?

Prices collapsed in February 1637; at the peak a single bulb of the prized Semper Augustus reportedly changed hands for 10,000 guilders, the cost of a grand Amsterdam canal house.

What caused the prized flame-like streaks on tulip mania's most coveted tulips?

The tulip breaking virus weakened the bulbs even as it made them beautiful, so the most valuable lines were slowly dying.

The word "tulip" comes ultimately from a Persian word for which item of clothing?

Tulip comes via Turkish tulbend from Persian dulband, 'turban': Europeans thought the bloom resembled the headwear, and the name travelled west with bulbs from the Ottoman court.

What is the Victorian-era practice of sending coded messages through flowers called?

Floriography, the language of flowers, swept England, France and North America in the 19th century, complete with dictionaries listing each bloom's meaning.

Which poet and letter-writer brought the flower-language craze to England from Constantinople in 1718?

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu described the Ottoman 'selam' of coded flowers in her Turkish Embassy Letters; she is better remembered for bringing smallpox inoculation home from the same trip.

In the modern language of flowers, a yellow rose stands for what?

Today a yellow rose means friendship and joy, though Victorian dictionaries read it as jealousy; deep red means romantic love and white means purity.

In which Shakespeare play does Ophelia hand out rosemary, fennel and rue?

In Hamlet (Act 4, Scene 5) Ophelia hands out rosemary 'for remembrance', fennel and rue, and regrets she has no violets, which withered when her father died.

Botanically speaking, the sharp growths on a rose stem are not thorns. What are they?

True thorns are modified stems; these are just outgrowths of the skin, which is why they snap off so cleanly.

Rose hips, especially from the dog rose, are among the richest plant sources of which nutrient?

Rose hips, the fruit left after the petals fall, are packed with vitamin C; Britain gathered dog rose hips for syrup in the Second World War when citrus was scarce.

Which US president signed the 1986 legislation making the rose the national floral emblem?

More than a century of lobbying preceded it; the rose had been proposed as the national flower repeatedly since the 1800s.

In the Wars of the Roses, the white rose was the badge of which royal house?

The white rose was the badge of the House of York; the Tudor rose, red outside and white inside, was invented afterwards to show York and Lancaster united.

Roughly how many accepted species does the orchid family contain?

Orchidaceae holds roughly 28,000 accepted species, growing on every continent except Antarctica; their dust-like seeds cannot germinate without a fungal partner.

The word "orchid" comes from the Ancient Greek for which part of the body?

Orchis is Greek for testicle: the paired underground tubers of the original Orchis species suggested the comparison to early botanists.

Enslaved 12-year-old Edmond Albius of Réunion invented the hand-pollination method still used for which crop?

Albius's 1841 trick with a thin stick and a thumb let vanilla orchids be pollinated by hand far outside their Mexican range, yet he died in poverty in 1880.

The bee orchid's lip looks and smells like a female bee. What is the flower trying to get a male bee to do?

In the north of its range the trick rarely works, so British bee orchids mostly just pollinate themselves.

The sacred lotus, Nelumbo nucifera, is the national flower of which country?

India adopted the sacred lotus as its national flower; it is also the unofficial flower of Vietnam and is sacred in both Hinduism and Buddhism.

Roughly how old was the sacred lotus seed from a Chinese lakebed that germinated in 1994?

Jane Shen-Miller germinated a seed radiocarbon-dated to about 1,300 years old from a dry lakebed in Liaoning; the lotus also holds its blooms at 30–35 °C on cold mornings.

What do engineers call the self-cleaning trick of Nelumbo nucifera leaves, copied in paints?

The lotus effect: a waxy, microscopically bumpy surface makes the leaf superhydrophobic, so droplets roll off as near-perfect spheres, carrying dirt with them.

Saffron, the world's most expensive spice, is made from the dried stigmas of which flower?

Crocus sativus gives just three crimson threads per bloom, and it takes about 150,000 flowers to produce a single kilogram.

Which country grows roughly 90 percent of the world's saffron?

Iran grows about 90 percent of the world's saffron, most of it in Khorasan; one freshly picked bloom yields only about 7 milligrams of dried spice.

Japan's centuries-old custom of picnicking and partying under blooming cherry trees is called what?

Hanami, 'flower viewing', goes back to the Nara and Heian courts; the favourite cultivar, Somei-yoshino, blooms and drops its petals within about a week, which is part of the appeal.

Which flower symbolises Japan's Emperor and gives the imperial seat its nickname, the "___ Throne"?

The Chrysanthemum Throne takes its name from the 16-petal chrysanthemum of the imperial seal; in France, Italy and Poland the same flower is reserved for funerals and graves.

The king protea, with a flower head that can be 30 cm across, is the national flower of which country?

South Africa adopted the king protea (Protea cynaroides) as its national flower in 1976, and its national cricket team is nicknamed the Proteas after it.

The blue poppy is the national flower of which Himalayan kingdom?

Bhutan's national flower is the Himalayan blue poppy (Meconopsis gakyidiana), a high-altitude species that grows above about 3,500 metres on the country's mountain passes.

The daffodil is the national flower of which part of the United Kingdom?

The daffodil is the national flower of Wales; it shares the job with the leek, and both are worn on St David's Day, 1 March.

Bluebonnets are the state flower of which US state, where a persistent myth says picking them is illegal?

Texas has no such law; Lady Bird Johnson simply encouraged planting them along highways, and the roadside displays became iconic.

Ohio's state flower, the red carnation, honours which assassinated president who always wore one?

Ohio adopted the scarlet carnation in 1904 in memory of William McKinley, who wore one in his lapel as a good-luck charm; Portugal's 1974 Carnation Revolution took its name from the same flower.

Hydrangea blooms act as a natural pH indicator. In alkaline soil, what colour do they usually turn?

Alkaline soil locks away aluminium ions; acid soil frees them, the plant absorbs them, and the very same bush flowers a different colour.

Poppies became a remembrance symbol after growing over soldiers' graves in which Belgian region in WWI?

Flanders' poppy fields gave John McCrae his 1915 poem, and an American teacher, Moina Michael, first proposed wearing the flower in 1918.

Every float in Pasadena's New Year's Day Rose Parade must be entirely covered with what?

Parade rules require every surface to be covered in flowers or other natural materials; seeds, bark and leaves all count, but artificial flowers and dyed materials are banned outright.

What does the name of the alpine flower edelweiss literally mean in German?

Edelweiss joins edel, 'noble', and weiss, 'white'; the white 'petals' are furry bracts that shield the tiny yellow florets from cold and UV at up to 3,400 metres.

The dandelion's name comes from the French for what?

Dandelion is dent-de-lion, 'lion's tooth', for the jagged leaves; the fluffy seed head, by contrast, is nicknamed a clock or blowball.

Magnolias evolved before bees existed. Which insects are thought to be their original pollinators?

The tough, bowl-shaped blooms can survive being chewed on, and fossil magnolias date back around 95 million years.

Malaysia's national flower, the bunga raya, is a hibiscus also nicknamed the "shoeblack plant". Why?

The Indonesian name kembang sepatu means 'shoe flower' for the same reason.

Which bright orange flower, cempasúchil, decorates altars and graves for Día de Muertos?

Cempasúchil is the Mexican marigold, Tagetes erecta; the Aztec name means 'twenty flower' and it is nicknamed flor de muertos, the flower of the dead.

Which artist's 1932 painting Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1 sold for $44.4 million in 2014, a record for a woman artist?

Georgia O'Keeffe's 1932 canvas sold at Sotheby's in November 2014 to Walmart heiress Alice Walton, and hangs at her Crystal Bridges museum in Arkansas.

Which naturalist proposed a 'horologium florae', a flower clock garden, in his 1751 Philosophia Botanica?

Carl Linnaeus sketched the horologium florae in Philosophia Botanica (1751); he probably never planted one, and gardens that tried found the timings only work in Uppsala's summer daylight.

True lilies of the genus Lilium are known to be highly toxic to which household pet?

Many plants called 'lily' are not true lilies, but the real ones can cause kidney failure in cats.

How many petal-like segments does a Lilium flower have?

Lilium flowers carry six tepals, three petals and three petal-like sepals, which spread or curl back to give shapes from funnel to 'Turk's cap'.

Which statistician used measurements of three Iris species in a famous 1936 paper?

Ronald Fisher's 1936 paper used Edgar Anderson's measurements of Iris setosa, versicolor and virginica; the data set became the standard teaching example of linear discriminant analysis.

On an iris flower, what are the three drooping sepals called?

Some rhizomatous irises carry a fuzzy 'beard' at the base of each fall.

Roughly how many accepted species does the genus Iris contain?

The genus Iris holds about 310 accepted species; some are commonly called flags, and the bulbous junos belong to the subgenus Scorpiris.

How long does a peony's blooming season typically last?

A single peony plant flowers for only about 7 to 10 days, which is why cut peonies are available only in late spring and early summer.

The peony has been the official state flower of which US state since 1957?

Indiana adopted the peony as its state flower in 1957, replacing the zinnia, which had held the title since 1931.

Lavender is a member of which group of plants?

Lavender belongs to Lamiaceae, the mint or sage family, alongside sage, rosemary and thyme; the genus Lavandula has 47 known species, native from Iberia to India.

Which two compounds are the main components of lavender oil?

Linalyl acetate and linalool together make up roughly half or more of lavender oil; around 93 phytochemicals have been identified in it altogether.

Jasmine belongs to the same plant family as which tree?

Jasminum sits in Oleaceae, the olive family, alongside lilac, privet and ash; the genus holds around 200 species prized for fragrance.

Which Egyptian village grows most of the jasmine used by the global perfume industry?

Shubra Beloula, in the Nile Delta's Gharbia governorate, supplies a large share of the jasmine concrete bought by perfume houses, though jasmine's centre of diversity is South and Southeast Asia.

What is the botanical genus name for lilacs?

Lilacs are the genus Syringa, about 12 species of woody plants in the olive family, closely related to privet.

The name 'daisy' is considered a corruption of which phrase?

The head closes at night and opens in the morning; Chaucer called it 'eye of the day'.

The common daisy's Latin name Bellis perennis roughly translates as what?

Bellis perennis means roughly 'pretty everlasting', from bellus, pretty, and perennis, lasting through the years; in medieval times the flower was also called bruisewort.

In horticulture, the large-flowered, multicoloured Viola cultivars raised from seed for bedding are usually called what?

Pansies come from Viola, the largest genus in its family, with more than 680 species.

Which Greek botanist coined the term 'dianthus', meaning divine flower?

Theophrastus, the 'father of botany', gave the flower the name dianthus, 'divine flower', and carnations appear in Greek literature more than 2,000 years ago.

The carnation's spicy scent earned it what common name?

Dianthus caryophyllus is the clove pink; its spicy, clove-like scent once flavoured wine, earning it the old name 'sops-in-wine'.

Gardenias belong to the same family as which beverage plant?

Gardenias belong to Rubiaceae, the coffee family, alongside Coffea and the quinine tree Cinchona.

The genus Gardenia honors a naturalist of which nationality?

Alexander Garden (1730-1791), a Scottish physician who settled in Charleston, South Carolina, corresponded with Linnaeus; John Ellis named the genus for him in 1761.

Which species of the tea genus is actually processed into tea?

Camellia sinensis is the tea plant; C. oleifera yields tea seed oil, while C. japonica and C. sasanqua supply hundreds of garden cultivars.

Truly yellow camellia flowers are found in the wild only in South China and which other country?

Golden camellias such as Camellia nitidissima grow wild only in Guangxi and northern Vietnam; the tea camellia, by contrast, is always white-flowered.

The genus name Digitalis, for foxgloves, comes from the Latin word for what?

The tubular flowers fit neatly over a fingertip; the plant yields the heart drug digoxin.

Which cardiac drug is extracted from foxglove plants?

Digoxin, a cardiac glycoside purified from the woolly foxglove Digitalis lanata, slows and strengthens the heartbeat; the plant is very toxic if eaten.

Japanese wisteria twines in which direction when viewed from above?

Japanese wisteria (Wisteria floribunda) twines clockwise seen from above, while Chinese wisteria twines counterclockwise, which helps tell the two species apart.

The world's largest known wisteria, spanning more than an acre, grows in which California town?

The Sierra Madre wisteria, planted from a one-gallon pot in 1894, covers more than an acre and weighs an estimated 250 tons.

Wisteria is a member of which group of plants?

Wisteria belongs to Fabaceae, the legume family, with pea-like flowers and seed pods; its woody vines are native to East Asia and the eastern United States.

The bird of paradise flower, Strelitzia, is the floral emblem of which US city?

Los Angeles made the bird of paradise its official city flower; it also appears on the reverse of South Africa's 50-cent coin.

Strelitzia is believed to be the only plant genus pollinated by which part of a bird?

Sunbirds perch on the spathe, which opens under their weight and dusts pollen onto their feet.

Dahlia tubers store their energy as which carbohydrate instead of starch?

Dahlia tubers store inulin, a polymer of fructose, rather than starch; the same carbohydrate fills chicory roots and Jerusalem artichoke tubers.

Dahlias come in almost every color except which one?

Breeders have never produced a true blue dahlia, as the plants cannot make blue delphinidin pigments; the 49 or so species are all native to Mexico and Central America.

The name Gladiolus is Latin for a small version of what object?

The plants are sometimes called sword lilies for their blade-shaped leaves.

Gladioli grow from which type of underground storage organ?

The corms resemble those of crocuses, wrapped in fibrous brown tunics.

The genus Zinnia honors an 18th-century scientist of which nationality?

Johann Gottfried Zinn (1727-1759) was a German botanist and anatomist at Göttingen; the flowers' centre of diversity is Mexico.

Which botanist separated Pelargonium from Geranium into two genera in 1789?

Charles Louis L'Héritier de Brutelle split Pelargonium from Geranium in 1789, undoing Linnaeus's lumping; garden centres went on calling pelargoniums geraniums anyway.

Unlike a true Geranium, a Pelargonium flower is zygomorphic, meaning what?

Pelargoniums are zygomorphic, with three lower and two upper petals, while Geranium flowers are radial.

The petunia's name comes from a Tupi-Guarani word for which plant?

Petun was the Tupi-Guarani word for tobacco, a close relative: petunias belong to the nightshade family alongside tobacco, tomatoes and potatoes.

Which rare red-flowered species in a nightshade genus is pollinated by hummingbirds?

Petunia exserta, a rare red species from a few sandstone outcrops in southern Brazil, is pollinated by hummingbirds; most petunias are insect pollinated.

The rhododendron is the national flower of which country?

Nepal's national flower is the tree rhododendron, lali gurans; the rhododendron is also the state flower of Washington and West Virginia.

The word rhododendron combines the Greek words for 'rose' and what?

Rhododendron joins the Greek rhodon, 'rose', and dendron, 'tree'; the genus has about 1,024 species, mostly from eastern Asia and the Himalayas.

Most azalea flowers carry how many stamens?

Azaleas typically have five stamens per flower, against ten in most 'true' rhododendrons; they make up two subgenera within Rhododendron.

The showy colored parts of a bougainvillea are actually what?

The true flowers are small and white, hidden inside the papery bracts.

Bougainvillea is named after a French explorer of which profession?

Botanist Philibert Commerçon described the plant while sailing with Louis Antoine de Bougainville.

The poinsettia is named after the first U.S. minister to which country?

Joel Roberts Poinsett brought the plant to the U.S. in the 1820s; the Nahuatl name is cuetlaxochitl.

The poinsettia, Euphorbia pulcherrima, belongs to which plant family?

The poinsettia is a member of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae, which is why a cut stem bleeds milky white latex like other euphorbias.

Which Encinitas, California grower once dominated the world poinsettia trade?

The Paul Ecke Ranch in Encinitas once supplied the great majority of the world's poinsettia cuttings; despite its reputation, the plant is not seriously poisonous to pets or children.

The giant Amazon water lily's genus was named in 1837 after which newly crowned monarch?

John Lindley named the genus Victoria in 1837 for the newly enthroned Queen Victoria, working from specimens Robert Schomburgk sent from British Guiana.

How wide can the floating leaves of the giant Amazon water lily grow?

The pads of the giant Amazon water lily reach up to 3 metres across, ribbed underneath and sitting on submerged stalks 7 to 8 metres long.

Plumeria is better known by which common name?

Plumeria is the frangipani: its milky sap irritates skin and eyes, but the night-scented flowers are prized for leis in Hawaii.

What is the central column bearing the stamens and pistil in a passion flower called?

The androgynophore, a stalk lifting both stamens and pistil above the petals, is the hallmark of Passiflora, a genus of about 550 species.

The snowdrop's genus name Galanthus combines the Greek words for 'flower' and what?

Its inner tepals carry green markings, and most species flower before the spring equinox.

How many leaves does a typical snowdrop plant produce?

The single drooping white flower has six tepals in two whorls.

The word 'daffodil' appears to derive from the name of which other flower?

'Daffodil' comes from 'affodill', a form of asphodel, the flower of the Greek underworld; the extra d is thought to come from Dutch 'de affodil'.

What is the cup- or trumpet-shaped central part of a daffodil flower called?

The corona, a cup or trumpet, sits above six petal-like tepals, often in a contrasting colour.

Which people are credited as the first to cultivate tulips, in the 10th century?

Persians were cultivating tulips by the 10th century; the flower later became the symbol of the Ottomans and reached northern Europe in the 16th century.

Which botanist planted tulips in Vienna in 1573 and spread the bulbs across Europe?

Clusius later took bulbs to Leiden, launching the Dutch tulip industry.

Tulips belong to which plant family?

Tulipa sits in Liliaceae, the lily family, beside Lilium and Fritillaria; about 75 species are divided among four subgenera.

Roughly how many paintings make up Monet's Water Lilies series?

They depict his garden at Giverny and occupied the last 31 years of his life.

Which Paris museum built two oval rooms to house eight large Monet water lily murals?

The Musée de l'Orangerie's two oval rooms, planned with Monet himself, opened in May 1927, months after his death, holding eight panels about 91 metres long in total.

Monet painted many of his Water Lilies while suffering from which eye condition?

Cataracts clouded Monet's vision from around 1912 and he had surgery in 1923; the Water Lilies were the main focus of his final decades at Giverny.

Wordsworth's poem 'I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud' was inspired by daffodils beside which lake?

Dorothy Wordsworth's journal records the 'long belt' of daffodils beside Ullswater, at Glencoyne Bay, on a walk with William on 15 April 1802.

How many lines long is Wordsworth's daffodil poem 'I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud'?

The familiar 1815 text runs 24 lines in four six-line stanzas (the 1807 original had three); it came fifth in the BBC's 1995 poll of the nation's favourite poems.

On the grounds of which institution is the RHS Great Spring Show held each May?

The show has been staged in the grounds of the Royal Hospital Chelsea since 1913 and lasts five days each May.

The RHS Great Spring Show was staged at which London venue from 1888 to 1911?

From 1888 to 1911 the Great Spring Show filled the Inner Temple Gardens beside the Thames, before moving to the Royal Hospital Chelsea in 1913.

What does the name Keukenhof literally mean in Dutch?

Kitchen garden is the literal sense: it once supplied the kitchen of a 15th-century castle, Slot Teylingen, and is now billed as the Garden of Europe.

Roughly how many flower bulbs are planted at Keukenhof each year?

Around 7 million bulbs are planted by hand each autumn across Keukenhof's 32 hectares, which open for only about eight weeks each spring.

In which Dutch municipality is Keukenhof located?

Keukenhof lies in Lisse, in the 'Dune and Bulb Region' of South Holland, southwest of Amsterdam.

The world's biggest flower auction, Royal FloraHolland, is headquartered in which Dutch town?

Its Aalsmeer building is the largest in Europe by floor area.

How many flowers did Royal FloraHolland destroy in March 2020 as COVID collapsed demand?

Royal FloraHolland growers destroyed some 400 million flowers in March 2020, about 140 million of them tulips, as sales collapsed by more than 70 percent.

The fleur-de-lis is a stylized depiction of which flower?

Fleur-de-lis means 'lily flower' in French, and heraldry treats it as a stylised lily, though some botanists argue the shape was first drawn from a yellow iris.

The fleur-de-lis appears on the flag of which Canadian province?

Quebec's Fleurdelisé, adopted in 1948, carries four white fleurs-de-lis on a blue field; the emblem came from the French royal arms used until 1789.

What is the collective term for all the petals of a flower?

The corolla is the ring of petals inside the sepals; in a fused corolla such as a petunia's the petals join into a single tube.

What is the collective name for a flower's sepals?

The calyx is the ring of sepals, usually green, that encloses and protects the flower in bud.

A stamen typically consists of an anther and which stalk?

The filament is the stalk that holds up the anther; all the stamens of a flower together form the androecium.

Which cactus has been found to carry as many as 3,482 stamens in a single flower?

A saguaro flower was recorded with 3,482 stamens; at the other extreme, Canna flowers have effectively half a stamen, a single fertile half-anther.

In pollination, pollen travels from a flower's anther to which part, before growing a tube down the style to the ovary?

The stigma catches the pollen, which then grows a tube down the style to the ovary, enabling fertilisation and seeds.

What is it called when one sperm nucleus forms the embryo and another forms endosperm?

Double fertilisation, unique to flowering plants, yields a seed with both an embryo and its own triploid endosperm food supply.

The word 'angiosperm' comes from Greek words meaning what?

Angiosperm joins Greek angeion, 'vessel', and sperma, 'seed': the seeds are enclosed within a fruit, unlike the naked seeds of gymnosperms.

Roughly how many known species of flowering plants are there?

About 300,000 known species make angiosperms by far the most diverse group of land plants, against roughly 1,000 living species of gymnosperms.

In which geological period did flowering plants diversify explosively to dominate the planet?

Flowering plants diversified explosively in the Cretaceous, roughly 130 to 90 million years ago, though their ancestors had split from the gymnosperm line more than 300 million years ago.

The forget-me-not is the official flower of which US state?

Alaska's territorial legislature adopted the alpine forget-me-not in 1917, and it stayed the state flower after statehood in 1959.

What is the French name for lily of the valley, often used for perfumes imitating its scent?

Muguet, lily of the valley, is given as sprigs across France every 1 May; the plant is highly poisonous because of cardiac glycosides, despite its sweet smell.

In pre-modern England, lily of the valley was known as 'glovewort' because it was used for what?

The name glovewort came from its use as a salve for sore hands; another old name, Apollinaris, came from a legend that Apollo discovered it.

Anemones are commonly known by what wind-related name?

Anemones are called windflowers, from the Greek anemos, 'wind'; in most species the colourful parts are sepals and true petals are missing.

The word chamomile comes from Greek words meaning what?

Chamomile comes from Greek chamaimelon, 'earth apple', for the apple-like scent; Matricaria chamomilla and Chamaemelum nobile are the two species used for herbal teas.

Which country has the highest diversity of Cosmos species, with 33 of the 35?

The name may come from the Greek for 'ordered world' or for 'jewel'.

Delphiniums are commonly known by which bird-related name?

Delphiniums are larkspurs, named for the spur behind each flower that resembles a lark's hind claw; crane's-bill is Geranium and cockscomb is Celosia.

In Greek myth, the hyacinth flower sprang from the blood of a youth killed by which god?

Zephyrus, the west wind, jealous of Hyacinth's love for Apollo, blew Apollo's discus off course to kill the youth, and the flower sprang from his blood.

Grape hyacinths belong to which separate genus?

Grape hyacinths are Muscari, small bulbs with grape-like clusters of blue bells; true hyacinths, Hyacinthus, are native to the eastern Mediterranean.

The garden nasturtium's name literally means what?

Nasturtium is Latin nasus tortus, 'nose-twister', for the peppery oil that wrinkles the nose; botanically the name belongs to watercress, Nasturtium officinale.

Which Franciscan monk and botanist first described the sweet pea in 1696?

Francesco Cupani, who first described the sweet pea in 1696, sent seed to the English schoolmaster Robert Uvedale in 1699, and the garden plant spread from there.

The sweet pea, Lathyrus odoratus, is native to which Mediterranean island?

Lathyrus odoratus grows wild in Sicily and southern Italy, where the flowers are purple; cultivars come in almost every colour.

Morning glories, moonflowers and the sweet potato all belong to which genus?

Ipomoea, the largest genus in the bindweed family with more than 600 species, includes the morning glories, the night-blooming moonflower Ipomoea alba and the sweet potato Ipomoea batatas.

Honeysuckle's genus name Lonicera honors a botanist from which era?

Adam Lonicer (1528-1586), a Renaissance German herbalist, gave his name to the genus; the common name refers to the sweet nectar sucked from the flowers.

Which Lonicera species has become an aggressive invasive around the world since the early 1800s?

Japanese honeysuckle, Lonicera japonica, was introduced to the United States in 1806 as an ornamental and now smothers native vegetation across the eastern states and on several continents.

Common heather, Calluna vulgaris, flowers during which months?

July to September is heather season on the moors; the plant, sometimes called ling, dominates European heathland and moorland.

The cornflower is also commonly known by what name?

Bachelor's button is the cornflower, Centaurea cyanus, once a weed of grain fields, hence 'corn'; intensive farming has made it scarce in the wild in Britain.

The blue pigment in cornflowers, protocyanin, produces which color in roses?

The same cyanidin anthocyanin that is red in roses is bound with iron and magnesium ions into the protocyanin complex that makes cornflowers blue.

The orchid genus Cattleya was named after a horticulturalist of which nationality?

John Lindley named Cattleya in 1824 for William Cattley, an English merchant and plant collector at Barnet, who flowered a plant sent from Pernambuco, Brazil.

Which orchid genus is commonly known as the moth orchid?

Phalaenopsis, the moth orchid, takes its name from the Greek for 'moth-like'; its roughly 70 species grow mostly in Indonesia and the Philippines.

The orchid genus name Vanda comes from which language?

Vanda is Sanskrit, the ancient Indian name for Vanda tessellata (formerly V. roxburghii); the genus has about 90 species across Asia.

How many living species of lotus, genus Nelumbo, exist today?

Nelumbo nucifera is Asian and Nelumbo lutea is native to North America and the Caribbean.

Members of the genus Ranunculus are commonly known by which name?

The genus has about 1,750 species, including the water crowfoots.

Which extremely poisonous flower is also known as monkshood or wolfsbane?

Aconitum, monkshood or wolfsbane, carries the alkaloid aconitine; the Greek name may come from akon, a dart, whose tips were poisoned with the plant.

Oleander is the only species in which genus?

Nerium has the single species Nerium oleander; it is poisonous but so bitter that human poisoning cases are rare.

Hibiscus is a member of which group of plants?

Hibiscus belongs to Malvaceae, the mallow family, alongside cotton, okra and cacao; Dioscorides' name hibiskos referred to the marsh mallow, Althaea officinalis.

Which garden flowers make up the genus Alcea?

Its more than 80 species are native to Asia and Europe; red ones attract hummingbirds.

In Scotland, the name 'bluebell' usually refers to which flower?

In Scotland 'bluebell' means the harebell, Campanula rotundifolia; elsewhere in Britain the bluebell is Hyacinthoides non-scripta, protected under UK law.

Columbines, genus Aquilegia, are known for petals bearing what feature?

In North America the spur lengths evolved to suit different pollinators.

Marigold petal meal is added to poultry feed to deepen the colour of what?

Tagetes petal meal, rich in the xanthophyll lutein, is mixed into poultry feed to deepen the orange of egg yolks and broiler skin.

The calla lily is the national flower of which African country?

Ethiopia's national flower is the calla lily, Zantedeschia aethiopica, although the plant is actually native to southern Africa; Linnaeus's epithet used Aethiopia loosely for Africa.

Fawn lilies and trout lilies belong to which genus, closely related to tulips?

Erythronium comes from the Greek erythros, 'red', after the pink-purple flowers of the European dog's-tooth violet; the genus includes the North American trout and fawn lilies.

The term 'sepalum' was coined in 1790 from a Greek word meaning what?

Noël Martin Joseph de Necker coined sepalum in 1790 from the Greek skepe, 'covering', since sepals shield the flower in bud.

Which genus of rootless duckweed, known as watermeal, contains the smallest flowering plants on Earth?

Wolffia specks look like floating cornmeal; Wolffia microscopica doubles its mass in about 29.3 hours, among the fastest growth measured in any flowering plant.

Which English physician first described using foxglove extract for heart conditions in 1785?

William Withering's 1785 'An Account of the Foxglove' documented dosing digitalis for dropsy, an account regarded as the beginning of modern therapeutics.

Which kitchen spice is the dried, unopened flower bud of a tree native to Indonesia's Maluku Islands?

Cloves are harvested once the buds turn bright red, and their oil is mostly eugenol, a compound used to ease toothache.

Many flower petals carry bee-guiding patterns that people cannot see, visible only in which kind of light?

Ultraviolet markings steer pollinators to the centre of the flower like runway lights, and the shade that bees see there has been nicknamed bee violet.

After fertilisation, which part of a flower swells and ripens into a fruit such as a tomato or cherry?

The ovary ripens into the fruit, which is why botanists class cucumbers, pumpkins and bean pods as fruits alongside cherries.

The word 'pistil', the female organ of a flower, comes from the Latin for which kitchen tool?

A pestle is the club used for pounding in a mortar, and early botanists thought the organ at the heart of a flower looked just like one.

Which fruit begins as a hollow, fleshy chamber lined on the inside with many tiny flowers?

A fig keeps its flowers hidden, so the tiny wasps that pollinate them have to squeeze in through a narrow pore at its tip.

Which tiny structures inside a flower develop into seeds once they have been fertilised by pollen?

Ovules become the seeds, and their protective outer layers turn into the seed coat.

The word 'petal' reached English in the 1700s from a Greek word that originally meant what?

Leaf is the root sense: Greek 'petalon' meant a leaf or a thin plate of metal, from an adjective for anything broad and outspread.

Which gland inside a flower secretes the sugary liquid that rewards visiting bees and hummingbirds?

The nectary is not confined to blooms: some plants grow extra ones outside the flower to feed animals that, in turn, protect them from plant-eaters.

Which vegetable is the flower bud of a cultivated thistle, picked before it has the chance to bloom?

Artichoke buds left unpicked open into purple thistle heads, and the 'choke' at the centre is a mass of immature flowers.

After fertilisation, which crop sends a thread-like peg from each flower into the soil, where its pods ripen?

Peanut plants bury their own fruit, a habit so unusual among legumes that the species was named 'hypogaea', from the Greek for 'under the earth'.

The strawberry is called an accessory fruit because its red flesh grows from which part of the flower?

The receptacle, the base that holds the flower's organs, swells into the red flesh, while each apparent seed on the outside is really a tiny fruit of its own.

Each strand of silk on an ear of corn is which greatly elongated part of a female flower?

A style runs from every single kernel to the tip of the ear, so each strand must catch a pollen grain of its own before its kernel can develop.

What is the feathery parachute that carries each dandelion seed away on the wind called?

A pappus stays aloft because air passing its bristles forms a stable ring-shaped vortex in its wake, giving the seed extra lift and drag.

What is the basic female unit of a flower, one or more of which join to form a pistil?

A carpel can ripen on its own: a pea pod grows from just one, splitting along two seams to release its seeds.

What is the main stalk that holds up a whole cluster of flowers, or one solitary bloom, called?

A peduncle keeps its name after fertilisation, when it carries the ripening fruit, while a flower with no stalk at all is described as sessile.

The giant bloom of the titan arum is not a single flower but which kind of structure?

An inflorescence is a whole cluster of flowers on one stem, and the titan arum's can stand more than 3 metres tall.

What is the white, petal-like hood that wraps around the flower spike of a peace lily called?

A spathe is not a petal at all: the peace lily's real flowers are the tiny ones packed along the fleshy spike that it surrounds.

In a pea or bean flower, what are the two fused lower petals that enclose the pollen-bearing parts called?

The keel is named for its boat shape, and in many pea-family flowers a visiting insect forces it downwards to release the pollen.

What is the botanical name for the enlarged, showy petal that gives insects a landing platform on an orchid?

The labellum starts out at the top of the bud, but in many orchids the opening flower twists so that it ends up underneath, ready for visitors to land on.

Carrot, parsley and dill carry their tiny flowers in which flat-topped cluster, with stalks spreading from one point?

An umbel takes its name from the Latin for a sunshade, the same root as umbrella, because its stalks spread out like the ribs of one.

What do botanists call each ring of similar parts, such as all the petals, arranged around a flower's centre?

A whorl comes in four kinds in most flowers, stacked in a fixed order from the protective outer ring inward to the seed-making centre.

Which term do botanists use for a single flower that carries both male and female working organs?

Perfect is the botanist's word for a bloom holding both sexes, the commonest arrangement of all, whereas holly keeps its male and female blooms on separate plants.

A lily flower can be divided into identical sectors around its centre, showing which type of symmetry?

Radial symmetry, the 'star-shaped' plan, is the ancestral one for flowers; the mirror-image form seen in orchids evolved later, many times over.

On a bearded iris, what are the three upright inner petals that rise above the drooping sepals called?

Standards crown a flower whose genus shares its name with the Greek goddess of the rainbow.

What is the collective name for all the stamens, the male parts, of a single flower?

The androecium takes its name from Greek words for 'man' and 'house', and it can range from a single stamen in some flowers to thousands in others.

What do botanists call the whole outer envelope of a flower, its sepals and petals taken together?

The perianth takes its name from the Greek for 'around the flower', and it is the part of a bloom that plays no direct role in reproduction.

On a maize plant, the male flowers that shed pollen sit in which feathery structure at the top of the stem?

The tassel relies on the wind to carry its pollen, though most of it comes down within a few metres of the plant.

In a flower, the tissue that the future seeds are attached to shares its name with which organ of mammal pregnancy?

The placenta of a flower feeds each future seed through a tiny stalk, much as a mammal's supplies a growing foetus.

What is the study of pollen grains and spores, used to solve crimes and reconstruct ancient climates, called?

Palynology takes its name from a Greek verb meaning 'I strew or sprinkle', and it is put to work in archaeology and honey production too.

Flowers whose parts come in multiples of three, as in tulips and irises, mark which great group of flowering plants?

Monocots also take in the orchids, the daffodils and all the grasses, which makes them the source of rice, wheat and maize.

In Greek myth, which youth who fell in love with his own reflection shares his name with the daffodil genus?

Narcissus may not be the whole story: the flower's name is also often linked to a Greek word meaning 'to make numb'.

The cherry trees around Washington, D.C.'s Tidal Basin began as a 1912 gift from the mayor of which city?

Tokyo's mayor Yukio Ozaki sent 3,020 trees, and within three years the United States had replied with a gift of flowering dogwoods.

Which golf major is played each April on a former plant nursery famed for its blooming azaleas?

The Masters is held at Augusta National, where every hole is named after a tree or shrub, among them the par-five 13th, Azalea.

Which Canadian city's May tulip festival grew from bulbs the Dutch royal family sent in thanks after World War II?

Ottawa sheltered the future Queen Juliana during the war, and her daughter Margriet was born there in a hospital ward declared extraterritorial.

Walt Whitman's poem 'When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd' is an elegy for which president?

Abraham Lincoln is never once named in the poem, which mourns him through lilacs, a drooping star and a hermit thrush.

The name 'primrose', given to several early spring wildflowers, comes from Medieval Latin words meaning what?

First rose is the literal sense of 'prima rosa', while the plant's botanical name Primula comes from a phrase meaning 'firstling of spring'.

In France, sprigs of lily of the valley are traditionally sold as a symbol of spring on which annual holiday?

May Day, France's Labour Day on 1 May, is the one day of the year when the flowers may be sold there without paying sales tax.

What name is given to the dangling, petal-less flower clusters that hazel, birch and willow bear each spring?

Catkins take their name from an old Dutch word for 'kitten', and most rely on the wind rather than insects to spread their pollen.

Which shrub, named after a royal head gardener, covers its bare branches in yellow flowers in early spring?

Forsythia honours William Forsyth, a founding member of the Royal Horticultural Society, and it blooms before its own leaves appear.

Primrose Day, 19 April, marks the death of which British prime minister, who was said to love the flower?

Benjamin Disraeli was sent bunches of primroses by the queen herself, and for decades his admirers wore them as buttonholes on the anniversary.

Lily of the valley, once the national flower of Yugoslavia, became the national flower of which Nordic country in 1967?

Finland's national flower is as dangerous as it is sweet-smelling: every part of the plant, red berries included, is potentially poisonous.

Galantamine, a drug first isolated from the bulbs of snowdrops, is used to treat which condition?

Alzheimer's disease in its early stages is treated with the compound, which daffodils and the red spider lily also produce.

A pot of hyacinths is sometimes added to the Haft-sin table laid for which spring new year festival?

Nowruz is celebrated on the spring equinox, and the table's seven main items all have names beginning with the same letter of the alphabet.

Which North American wildflower makes enough heat to melt its way up through frozen ground in early spring?

Skunk cabbage can run 15 to 35 °C warmer than the air around it, so it blooms while snow and ice still cover the ground.

Many spring-flowering plants will not bloom until they have felt a long spell of winter cold, a process called what?

Vernalization, from the Latin for 'of the spring', makes sure that flowering and seed-setting wait for spring instead of happening in autumn.

The 'Tulip Era' of 1718 to 1730, named after a court craze for the flower, was a peaceful period for which empire?

Ottoman court society grew so fond of the flower that tulips came to stand for nobility and privilege, until a revolt brought the era to an end.

The white trillium, a spring woodland wildflower, is the official floral emblem of which Canadian province?

Ontario adopted it in 1937, and despite a widespread belief, no law specifically makes picking one illegal in the province.

'May blossom' is a traditional English name for the late-spring flowers of which common hedgerow tree?

Hawthorn generally flowers in May, hence the name, and it also goes by quickthorn, whitethorn and the ominous motherdie.

Which pickled garnish is the unopened flower bud of a thorny shrub found around the Mediterranean?

Capers are usually picked every morning, because the youngest and smallest buds fetch the highest prices.

The papery green cones that give beer its bitterness and aroma are the flowers of which plant?

Hops come as separate male and female plants, and growers keep only the females, because pollinated seeds are unwanted in brewing.