Rose-hip

After yesterday's outing, much of this morning was spent identifying the remaining tricky specimens and entering all the data I'd gathered. One of my mystery species was a rose - often tricky to identify and this proved no exception. The hips are one of the most diagnostic features, and have to be bisected to see the internal structure. This one was past its best, but still shows a conical disc at the top of the hip pierced by a hollow cylinder through which the styles emerge. Such a feature is characteristic of the Short-styled Field-rose, but other characters of the species were absent, so it may well be a hybrid between this and Dog-rose. Whatever the identity, bisecting the hip clearly shows the fine hairs surrounding the seeds, that can be dried and used as a very effective itching powder!

In the afternoon Pete, Chris, Lizzy and I went over to see Molly, who was in much better form than when we last saw her. The chest infection that she'd been suffering from was in fact mild pneumonia, so now wonder she felt quite miserable. She's now been told that her immune system isn't functioning very well, so she needs to keep away from people with colds and flu - not easy at this time of year. At least we were all free from any viruses and shouldn't have passed anything on to her.