Whilst recently researching the wildflower families, I fell down a fruit-shaped rabbit hole.  And it is because of the amount of variety shown in the fruit of the Rosaceae, or rose family.

Japanese rose Rosa rugosa

For more on what makes a plant a member of the Rosaceae, check out my recent blog Wildflower families: Rosaceae.

Where to start?  There’s a lot of variety, and taking a look at my Fruit variety and terminology blog might help.

Rosaceae Fruit: Aggregate Fruit

Rosaceae fruit are one to two seeded, and often form together into aggregates, or aggregate fruit.  Think of a blackberry or a raspberry.  Each of those little lumps (or drupelets) houses a seed.  They clump together to form what we see as one fruit, although it is an aggregate of many.  Think how many seeds you find when eating one blackberry!

Jersey Post copyright 2027 Jersey bramble Rubus caesarius

If you have time to spare, have a look at my step by step blog on painting a blackberry.

Rosaceae Fruits: Drupes

Some other Rosaceae grow drupes.  A drupe is a fleshy fruit which has a thin skin and grows around a central hard stone.  Inside the stone (or pip, or kernel) is the seed.

Plum Prunus prunus fruit

Plums and cherries are drupes.  In the states, the term “stone fruit” is used.  This refers to any soft fruit with a woody stone, such as apricots and peaches.

Peach Prunus persica with stone (and seed) removed

Rosaceae fruits: Aggregates of Achenes

Some have aggregates of single-seeded achenes.  Some of these have spines which catch onto fur for seed dispersal.  These are actually called awns, and are formed from the persistent remains of the style.

Piri Piri bur Acaena novae-zelandiae seedhead and individual achene with awns

Other examples include Herb bennet, Geum, and Mountain avens.

Water avens Geum rivale showing flower and seed head with awned achenes

Others, like Meadowsweet, twist their achenes together into a spiral.

Potentilla seed heads look a lot like those of the Ranunculaceae family, an assembly of achenes borne in a globe-like arrangement.

Rosaceae Fruit: The Pseudo-fruit (Rosehip)

Rosehips are not made from the carpels of a flower.  The seeds within are formed from carpels, with their thin coats.  But the red or orange fleshy part of a rosehip is called a hypanthium.  It is just a fleshy shell, housing the real fruit, the achenes (formed from carpels), each bearing one seed.  The hypanthium is formed from swollen receptacle flesh.

Japanese Rose Rosa rugosa rosehip cross section

The receptacle is the part of the plant where the flowering parts are attached, not the female flower parts themselves.  Receptacles lie below the flowering structure, and explains why we see that distinctive brown bit at the “bottom” of a rosehip.  They are the remnants of the calyx and other flowering structures, and if you look closely you can sometimes see old stamens.  Which makes that the “top” of the pseudo fruit, I suppose.

Rosehip anatomy diagram

Rosaceae Fruit: The Pome

One of the most commercially important Rosaceae, the apple, carries its’ seeds in a Pome.  A pome is a swelling of the receptacle, not the carpel.  It is built of several hypanthium (enlarged receptacle) which have grown together.

At the centre of this we find the pericarp which contains five to thirteen seeds (it’s commonly known as the apple core), depending on how successful pollination was.

Diagram showing the structure of the Pome (apple)

So next time you eat an apple or a pear, remember that the distinctive brown bit at the “bottom” is the residual flowering parts, specifically the calyx.

Pear sprig with blossom and fruit Pyrus communis

For more on pomes, check out this blog from Where the spruce eats.  To be sure you can tell your pome from your drupe, take a look at this blog from Toronto botanical garden.

Rosaceae Fruit: The Strawberry

The strawberry bears its’ seeds on the outside, and in fact every yellow seed is a strawberry fruit.  The fleshy part (which we eat so cheerily) is made from swollen receptacle tissue, rather like the apple (a pome).

Wild strawberry Fragaria vesca with external fruits and seeds on a swollen receptacle

However, the big difference is that the seeds of the strawberry are on the outside not the inside, and it is the only fruit which does this.  It is therefore not only delicious but also remarkable.

Conclusion

This blog is far from exhaustive, and I have no doubt I could find enough to write an entire blog about the core of an apple.  I hope this serves as an introduction to the variety and fascinating structures of the fruit of the  Rosaceae.

Sketchbook study of the Dog rose Rosa canina

The post Rosaceae Fruit appeared first on Lizzie Harper.

This series talks about some common wildflower families.  For basic terminology, look at my  the basics of botany blog, and another on different fruit types.  For more on scientific names, how they work, and why they matter,  look at What’s in a name 1 and part 2.  Take a look at  the other families I’ve looked at so far, the  Ranunulaceae (Buttercups), Caryophyllaceae (Campions), and Brassicaceae (Cabbages)  I hope to add more families over the coming months.

Rock cinquefoil Potentilla rupestris

I know a little about wildflowers,  but I am an amateur, and not a trained botanist.  So although I’ll try and get stuff right, if you see a mistake, please let me know.

Wildflower families: Rosaceae

The Rose family has 107 genera and over 3100 species globally.  Flowers have five or ten petals, and often have an epicalyx (see below).   Leaves have stipules, and tend to be alternate.  There’s a vast array of fruits in this family, from plums and apples to strawberries, Mountain avens with its dry achenes in one head, to Lady’s mantle with a lone seed in a receptacle.  As well as Roses, other Rosaceae garden flowers include Cotoneasters, Pyrocanthus, and Geums.  Our most common fruit crops are Rosaceae, and lots of highly varied wild flowers are in this family, including Cinquefoil, Meadowsweet, and Agrimony.

Entire leaved Cotoneaster Cotoneaster‌ integrifolius and other Cotoneaster species

(For more on telling Cotoneaster species apart, not a fun occupation, please check out my blog).

Rosaceae overview

Plants in this family have alternate leaves with stipules at their base.  A stipule is like a tiny leaf that grows in pairs at the base of a leaf stalk, next to the stem. Flowers have five or ten petals, lots of stamens, and can be solitary or in racemes. The name Rosaceae comes from the Latin for rose, Rosa.  There’s a suggestion that the name is far more ancient than that, possibly dated back to ancient Persia where ornamental roses were first grown.

Copyright Jersey Post: Roses Nostalgia Rosa Nostalgia

Some members of this family reproduce asexually, without seeds.  Strawberries do this with runners, while Raspberries, Blackberries, and some roses put up suckers at some distance from the parent plant.

Barren strawberry Potentilla sterilis showing a runner

Rosaceae Leaves

Rosaceae leaves are often lobed, with toothed or deeply notched margins.  (For more on leaf margins, look at my blog).  Some may be very deeply lobed, like Tormentil.

Tormentil Potentilla erecta

Some Rosaceae have compound leaves made of an array of smaller leaflets rather than simple ones  (For more on simple versus compound leaves check out my blog).  You can tell if a Rosaceae leaf is compound or simple by looking for a stipule.  You’ll only stipules at the base of a leaf, so if you look at a Rosaceae “leaf” and see no stipules, it could well be a leaflet.  Examine a rose leaf (compound, of many leaflets) or a Blackberry (likewise) and use the stipule position to decide where the stalk of the entire leaf (not that of a leaflet) attaches to the plant.  The shape of leaves, if not the size, is pretty consistent across the whole plant.

Agrimony Agrimonia eupatoria clearly showing basal stipules

Stipules can be tiny to really large, smooth to toothed.  Often the stipules can prove confusing as they resemble part of the main leaf.

Rosaceae Flowers

Rosaceae flowers are regular, with radial symmetry.  They have five petals, which tend to overlap, and five to ten sepals which also overlap but mostly do not fuse.

Blossom of Pear Pyrus communis

Some Rosaceae have an epicalyx, a whorl of bracts just below the calyx.  You can see this in the Cinquefoils and the Strawberry.  If you look closely at the green “top” of a strawberry, you can see the sepals, the epicalyx in a circle below them, and you may also see some residual stamens, clinging to the inner edges of the calyx array.  There’s a good blog on this, by The botanist in the kitchen.

Wild strawberry Fragaria vesca showing calyx and epicaylx

Flowers grow in compound clusters at the ends of the stem, known as cymes or racemes.  However, they can also be solitary.

They are bisexual with lots of stamens surrounding one or many free carpels.  The stamens, should you care to examine them, grow in whorls of 5 or more, but this can be really hard to see.  They bend inwards towards the flower.

Individual Hawthorn blossom Craetegus monogyna showing incurved stamens

Carpels (the female reproductive organ of a flower, consisting of a style, an ovary, and a stigma) tend to be superior, growing above the flowering structure.  In some species, they are Perigynous, meaning the flowering parts grow around the edge of the receptacle where the pistil (the tube down to the seed, through which pollen has to travel to fertilize the ovule and form a seed) is housed.  Cherries and roses are perigynous. For more on ovary positions look at my blog on the ovary.

Cherry Prunus avium

Rosaceae Fruit: Aggregates, Drupes and Achenes

There is an extraordinary amount of variety in the fruits of the Rosaceae, and I’ve ended up putting my research here into a separate blog which I’ll publish in a week or two.  Below is a summary.

Rosacea produce one to two seeded fruit, but that’s where the similarities end.

Consider the variation.  Like the Ranunculaceae, some species have assemblies of achenes. Some achenes have spikes to help dispersal, such as the Geum and Avens species.  Or have achenes twisted together so they look like a “mister whippy” ice-cream, a beautiful effect shown by Measdowsweet.

Assembled carpels of the Mountain avens Dryas octopetala

Some familiar soft fruit, like the blackberry and raspberry, are made of lots of individual fruits.  Each a little “blob” is called a drupelet, and contains one or two seeds.  These are known as aggregate fruit.  From the position of the calyx, you can tell these have developed from superior ovaries.

Copyright Jersey post 2017 Blackberry Rubus fruticosa

Drupes are formed when ovary tissue swells to become fleshy, enclosed in a thin skin.  At the centre of this you have a hard stone, a woody coat for the seed within.  Peaches, plums, cherries and apricots are drupes.

Plum Prunus prunus

Apples and pears are pomes.  A pome is formed from the receptacle, the area below the flowering structure.  This swells and within it you find the apple core with five to ten pips.

Somerset redstreak apple Malus domestica

Strawberries attach their fruit to the outside of a swollen receptacle.  The fleshy red bit isn’t a fruit at all.  The fruit is each of the tiny yellow seeds embedded in the red flesh.

Strawberries Fragaria × ananassa

Rosaceae: Other species

As well as the fruit discussed, Rosaceae contains the Lady’s mantle, Silverweed, Cinquefoil, Piri-piri bur, Rowan, Sorbus species, Cotoneasters, and (of course) roses.

Piri Piri bur Acaena novae-zelandiae

Conclusion

I hope this blog on the Rosaceae wildflower family was of some interest.  What a varied family!  I hope to do more of these blogs over the coming weeks and months.  References include my FSC botany course, the Common Families of Flowering Plants by Michael Hickey & Clive King, and information from Naturespot.

Rowan Sorbus aucuparia sprig with berries and blossom

The post Wildflower families: Rosaceae, the Rose family appeared first on Lizzie Harper.

The fruits and berries that needed illustrating were the Dewberry Rubus caesius, the Elderberry Sambucus nigra, the Wild strawberry Fragaria vesca, the Jersey bramble Rubus caesarius, Sloes Prunus spinosa, and Black bryony Dioscorea communis.

All the botanical illustrations in this blog are copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017, and must not be reproduced without their express permission.

Sloes artwork for one of the stamps                                copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

This commission gave me the chance to wander the countryside around Hay-on-Wye, gathering specimens to paint; luckily the job came in during the autumn months!

Desk whilst illustrating the Dewberry stamp artwork

I also illustrated a First Day cover (an illustration for the corner of the First Day Cover envelope); this was a sprig of Hawthorn berries Crataegus monogyna.

Hawthorn berries; botanical illustration for the First Day Cover of Jersey Post’s stamp issue-copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

Here’s a detail of some of the wonderfully prolific and vibrant red berries this sprig of Hawthorn carried.

Detail of Hawthorn berries                                              copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

Illustrating Black Bryony

One of the plants I painted was the Black bryony.  You often see the startling orange berries of this plant in hedgerows.  It was important to show the variation in berry colour; green through yellow to an orange red.  I also had a lot of fun with the tendrils that this plant grows.  I love using these to help when composing an illustration.

As always, painting the leaves began with a layer of tiny paint marks, building up and marking the areas of dark.

Painting the first layer of green on a Black bryony leaf copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

Next, I put a yellower and more dilute mix of green over the entire leaf.  I use Winsor and Newton paints, and a Winsor and Newton series 7 paintbrush.

Brighter green wet wash applied to the leaf.  Copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

The angled stems and tendrils get plotted in next.  As always I leave the fun berries to the end.

Painting in stems and tendrils of Black bryony                   copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

The berries needed to look bright and smooth, so I spent a long time building up the colour with endless tiny brush strokes in orange and red, following the shape of the fruit.

Final illustration of Black bryony                                      copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

Illustrating the Elderberry

Another lovely plant was the Elderberry. I love the crimson of the stems of this plant, especially in contrast to the shiny black berries.  Getting the shine right on each berry was a challenge.

Paining each Elderberry                                                  copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

It was a tricky plant to arrange in the format of a postage stamp, and required the positioning of the leaflets behind the berries, always a difficult task.

Elderberry artwork                                                         copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

Presenting the illustrations in context

Another part of the commission is to illustrate the Presentation pack, the shiny decorated sleeve in which newly issued postage stamps can be delivered.  This features Rowan berries Sorbus aucuparia, Sloe Prunus spinosa, Bramble Rubus fruticosus, and Goji berries Lycium barbarum; all of which grow wild in Jersey.

Presentation pack with Rowan, Goji, Sloe and Bramble      copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

One of the things I like to do mid way through a job such as this, is create a mock up of the stamps to ensure they look alright as a series, and to be certain the text and images work well together.  Here is the rough of the stamp layout, an aid to the commissioners when they look at these detailed roughs and decide what feedback is required.

Layout of stamps at Colour rough stage                           Copyright Jersey Post (www.Jerseystamps.com) 2017

The published stamps, first day cover, and presentation pack arrived in the post just this week.  To say I am delighted with how they look once the designers have produced the issue is an understatemant, they’ve done a fabulous job with my paintings!

This job was a joy, I really love working with Jersey Post, they give interesting subjects, long lead times, and treat their artists really well – what more could an illustrator ask for?

The post Botanical Illustrations of Fruit for Jersey Post appeared first on Lizzie Harper.

Drawing up the rough of the Wild Strawberry

I begin by drawing up the rough in pencil, using a mechanical pencil such as the P205.  I draw direct onto the paper I’ll paint on, Fabriano Artistico hotpress.  There are lots of wild strawberry plants around, despite it being autumn, and I even found one in flower in the garden!  Very convenient, and it meant sourcing reference was pretty straight forward.  I also used the illustrations of Stella Ross-Craig for back-up; her drawings combine botanical accuracy with a real “feel” of a plant and are an invaluable resource for any botanical illustrator of British plants.

Focus on one leaf: Step by step

Wild Strawberry Fragaria vesca rough

Once the FSC have ok’d the rough, it’s time to get the paints out.  I use Winsor & Newton watercolour paints, and a number 1 Winsor & Newton sable series 7 brush.  As always, I begin by plotting in the shadows.  This is made lots easier because I have a leaf to work from, rather than working from photos.

The green of these shadows is quite yellow, so I used hooker green light with cadmium yellow light and lots of yellow ochre.  In truth, the colour I mixed was a little too dark.

Then I watered the colour down a touch and painted in the edges and some of the other dark areas of the leaf.  I was keen to keep the dentate margins crisp, and allowing the drying of wet paint to supply this sharp edge is a useful technique.

Next I put a unifying wash on the leaf; this one’s based on a green but is rich with yellow and yellow ochre.  Only the brightest highlights are allowed to remain untouched by paint.

I mix up a darker green to work into the shadows and edges; hooker green light with a winsor blue, a touch of vandyke brown, and a little purple or violet.

Applying the same technique to all the Wild strawberry leaflets

The same technique is then applied to the other leaflets; although as the smaller, younger leaflets are a brighter green the colour mix incorporates more cadmium yellow light, and I don’t take the margins and shadows as dark in tone as with the larger leaf.

I paint in the stems, surprisingly yellow.  I like to finish different elements of the plant in turn, so for now the strawberry flower is left as unpainted white space.

Illustrating the wild strawberry flower

The little flower is tricky; although it’s white it needs to have shape.  I used a very light cerulean blue to show the slight shadow towards the centre of the flower, and by making the sepals a rich and slightly dark green you can ensure the petals look starkly white.  Placing a leaf behind a white flower is a good trick, and makes life easier; have a look at botanical illustrations across the board and you’ll see how frequently this approach to painting white flowers is used.  For more on painting white flowers, please look at my earlier blog.

Stems, leaves, and roots

The smallest leaflets and tendrils need plotting in, again, keeping the green light and fresh is important, and remembering where the shadows fall.  I also took the toothed margin of the large leaflet a little darker to make it stand out.

Painting the strawberries

The fruit came next.  Although I love mixing the red of the wild strawberries; scarlet doctor martin ink, alizarin crimson, opera rose and cadmium orange light; I was at a disadvantage as there were no fruit to be seen.  Luckily I could work from my sketchbook study (which appeared in The Hedgerow Handbook).

Sketchbook study of wild strawberries

Initially I was miserable with the strawberries.  They looked unappetising, dry, too brown and flat.

I decided to take the darkest areas of the berries darker still, and to put a rich red wash on top of them, based on doctor martin’s scarlet watercolour ink.  It worked!  The berries were redeemed!

There’s almost nothing that fills me with more relief than managing to turn a poor bit of illustration around.  It’s never as good as it would have been it you’d got it right in the first place, but to turn it from awful to passable (and thus save a day or two of repeat work as you start all over) is a great sensation.  There are plenty of ways to fix mistakes in watercolour, as my blog on the subject shows….

So, at the end of the working day, here’s a photo of my desk.  Bits of strawberry leaf torn up all over the place, sketchbook pored over, paint-box needing a good clean but, most vital of all, a botanical illustration of the wild strawberry plant completed.  Phew.

The post Step by step illustration of a Wild Strawberry appeared first on Lizzie Harper.

Defining an Achene

The ACHENE is “a small dry indehiscent single-seeded fruit” (Flora of the Birtish Isles, Clapham Tutin and Moore). So far so good.  Yet under this umbrella definition is an enormous amount of variety.  The fruit of the buttercup and crowfoot is often referred to as a “typical achene”.  A typical achene is a fruit containing a single seed, where the fruit wall has hardened around the seed inside and thus covers it like a coat (without sticking to it).

Creeping buttercup

Explaining that definition!

INDEHISCENT means the fruit won’t open to disperse the seed at maturity.

Achenes only contain one seed.  Each achene is formed of this single seed produced by one carpel.  A CARPEL is one of the units that the GYNOECIUM is made from.  And a GYNOECIUM?  That’s the female parts of a flower.  It’s the ovary (which, when fertilized grows into the seed), the style, and the stigma.

Winged achenes

Sometimes, an achene can have wings. If so it’s called a SAMARA.  These wings are extensions of part of the tissue of the wall around the seed.  It grows outwards and flattens.  The purpose of these wings is to aid in wind dispersal, which explains why it’s mostly tree species who develop them.  Wings can grow on both sides of the seed; as in the case of the elm, bush willows, and hoptree.

Elm with winged achene (samara)

Samara can also have one wing or extension, leaving the seed at one end of the wing.  This is the case for maples (where these single winged samara are paired into the instantly recognisable shape), and for the ash.

Maple

The benefit for a tree of this design is that the seed “auto-rotates” as it falls, ensuring a clean and distant dispersal from the parent tree.  When something auto-rotates, it means that it goes on rotating as it falls through air in a steady fashion (as un-powered helicopter blades would do).  Try it next time you have a maple or ash key in your hand, it’s a nifty piece of aerodynamics.

Asteraceae and the achene

Asteraceae are plants made of two types of flower, ray and disk florets.  A common example is the daisy, and the dandelion.  Each yellow “dot” in the centre of a daisy is a single yellow disc floret.  Every white external “petal” is a ray floret.  Asteraceae species have different ray and disc florets according to species.  Across the entire botanical family (which used to be called Compositae), CYPSELA are their seeds.

Here we encounter a slight hiccough.  Some botanists claim that although cypsela are similar to achenes, they are, in fact, a different thing.  This is because they’re produced from a compound inferior ovary with one locule.  This means they’re produced by several ovaries which are joined together, each one of which is made of one chamber.  The whole lot is sited below the petals and rest of the female flower parts.

Most botanists agree that a cypsela is very similar to an achene.  They permit it to be used as the same umbrella term, hence it appears in this blog.

The dandelion seed, with its distinctive parachite, is a cypsela.  The fluffy part is made from part of the calyx, whose tissues have evolved into the intricate flying machine which attaches to each seed.

The sunflower seed is another example of a cypsela . The white or striped cover of the seed is the wall of the cypsela fruit.  Dissect a sunflower seed. See the hard outer coat and the seed inside; closely surrounded by -but not attached to- the fruit’s wall.

Within each rose hip, hidden amongst the hairs and the flesh, are a few achenes.

External achenes

For me, the most remarkable fact I found about achenes was they can be external.  The seeds that pepper the outside of a strawberry are all individual achenes.  Each one encases a single seed.  The delicious strawberry that we eat is, in fact, not a fruit at all (each of the strawberry pips IS a fruit).  It’s merely the sweet tissue which bears the achenes.

Other achene-bearing plants include: the tall anenome, cannabis, buck-wheat, crows-foot, lesser celendine, globe artichoke, spearwort, fleabane, zinnias, chrysanthemums, lettuce, marigold, echinacea…  Considering how many plants bear achenes, I reckon it’s worth knowing what one is.  Hopefully this blog has helped to explain just that.

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