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doctor-fancy-pants · 1 year

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This kind of thing sure does happen a lot

Me, before the voyage: "I shall have interesting stories to tell and adventures to share, there will be laughs and weirdness, it'll be great!"

Me, on the voyage, after just about every 12 hour shift: "I am so tired I can see through time. Don't get excited. It's parallel vision only."

[insert Good Place "Time Knife" gif] (our fancy satellite internet - which is, to be fair, generally very good - is coughing and spluttering a bit at the moment, and "cabin 106 is looking for the perfect gif on Tumblr" ranks a bit down the priority list if anything needs throttling.)

It's possible some of the tiredness is related to my determination to extend one of those 12 hour shifts into a 17 hour shift, because the two shallowest sampling sites (50m) were coming up both on the other shift, and godfkndammit I am a feather star taxonomist and guess where you find all the fkn feather star diversity...? Shallow water in the tropics.

It's also where you find all the rest of the diversity as well - though I will note you will generally find less football-sized, 2kg sea cucumbers. Even the larger shallow water cukes are much smaller, at least on balance.

I feel like I should note that this photo was taken a couple of weeks ago - I think - and on the shift just passed I managed to get six more individuals of this species, one of which blew past our recorded weight (this one was about 1.9 kgs, I think, and this morning our Big Mama was somewhere around 2.3kgs).

They are very slippery. They also like to poop in the tray when you're trying to pull tube feet for DNA, and to be honest, I do not blame them one bit.

Then there's this one.

This fellow was about 2.8kgs.

This is the species we have dubbed "Purple Loaf" (the other species is "Purple Football"). I have cropped the photo so that you cannot see the entirety of my gormless expression, but I'll have you know that this specific individual literally just spawned into my hands as I was racing to get it into the nelly tub in the lab, before I set up to take the shot.

Giant piles of foaming sea cucumber jizz, all over the lab floor.

(I lost it.)

(Look, if you can't laugh hysterically on a research voyage when a cuke fires off into your hands, when can you?)

Anyways, the expression on my face reflects that experience.

Ultimately, I did expect to have more downtime on this voyage, because we were doing so much more deep water sampling! I knew that, as the only echinoderm specialist on board (other than Chief Scientist, who was doing many other things), I would be responsible for the starfish and brittle stars and feather stars (yay!) and sea lilies and sea urchins and sea cucumbers... sure!

What I did not realise was that:

(1) sea cucumbers are very challenging and time-consuming to collect and preserve; and

(2) they are big players in the deep sea fauna. They are so much larger and so much more dominant once you get out past the shelf! and they are a crucial component of the biodiversity in the vast and lightless depths.

They took up a bit more of my time than I was expecting, so I am not having the chill times that I was hoping for. That's okay! It just means I'll have to dole out the anecdotes in bits and pieces after I get home.

But also: when there was an opportunity for the feather stars to appear, I was there, and it was a very, very long day.

Tomorrow is our last on-shift of sampling. I'm sad about it. There's something wonderful about being out here and doing this. I will miss these people, I will miss this work, and I will miss the wonders.

But I'm also exhausted and would like to get back to a daylight circadian rhythm, and my husband, and my pets.

#too tired for tags #marine biology

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advancement-made · 10 months

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Your list is complete. It was almost too large for tumblr.

~ Gimmick Blog Taxonomist

...I am so sorry to say this, but there are at least two more.

#epprbcu #not rpg #out of character

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thadeeliv · 1 year

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taxonomists of Tumblr, could members of two different genera have the same species name (e.g. could there be a Canis erectus or a Carassius annuus)?

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etirabys · 2 years

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tumblr mobile is not letting me send you this link directly but the “im an accountant” video you seek was reblogged by taxonomist and is on her front page right now ACT FAST

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hadalpelagiczone · 4 months

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I found the tumblr taxonomist you guys are about to be bombarded with images of frogs (this is a threat and a promise)

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markscherz · 4 months

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FAQ

I get a lot of asks on tumblr, and I of course cannot expect you to scroll through my erratic post history on tumblr before you ask anything (though you can browse my tag #Answers by Mark, if you want). So instead, I have pinned this post that has an FAQ, which you can refer to before submitting a question, to check if it has been asked before.

Personal Questions:

What is your favourite frog/lizard/…?

How old are you? Where do you live? Where are you from? What languages do you speak?

What do/did you study?

Are you going to [insert meeting here] conference?

How did you get into Malagasy herpetology?

What is your relationship status?

How did you get where you are today?

That bread you make looks really fucking incredible, where do I get a recipe so I can get it in my FACE?

Science-related Questions:

How do I become a herpetologist/any advice for someone interested in a career in herpetology?

What is it like being a taxonomist?

How do I learn about the taxonomy of reptiles or amphibians?

I’m travelling to Madagascar; can you give me some advice?

How can I get into field research in Madagascar?

What is the best part about field work?

What is Zoology like as a career path?

Should I be a zoologist if I’m not good at school/not passionate about it?

How much money will I earn as a zoologist?

Will I struggle in herpetology/zoology as a female?

Can you recommend American colleges to me to study Zoology?

Can you identify this herp for me?

Can snakes hear?

I want to be a vet, can you give me some advice?

Is the distinction between poisonous and venomous really that important?

Are you a lumper or a splitter?

Can you help with my homework?

#FAQ #answers by Mark

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gimmickblog-taxonomist · 9 months

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whats the line you draw when it comes to gimmick blogs vs highly themed blogs? do heritage blogs count? what about the secret staff blog? does firefox-official count??

Out of the ones you've listed, I'd draw the line at firefox-official. Little of their posts seem to correlate to pretending to be the official firefox account, while the others keep some consistency (i.e. the "secret staff blog"). Heritage blogs most definitely count.

#might have to make an official definition for gimmick blogs at some point #gods this is literally just making tumblr a science #tumblrology #taxonomist talks #ask

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wasppilled · 3 years

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species "complex"? i find it quite simple, re- oh wait oh god nevermind you're right. i take it back

#(geiger counter clicks)#wheres my taxonomists who use tumblr. are you out there #taxonomy #entomology #species complex #biology #back at it again with posts that might appeal to like 3 people

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sideblogformindtrash · 3 years

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A PLANT GUIDE TO ALTERNATIVE FOOD SOURCES/PLANT BASED MEDICINE/POISONOUS HERBS

FOR WHEN YOU ARE A 15th CENTURY PEASANT AND GOING TO THE DOCTOR WILL KILL YOU BECAUSE NO ONE HAS WASHED THEIR HANDS IN A MONTH.

This post ended up huge.

DISCLAIMER CAUSE I DON’T WANT ANYONE TO GET SICK BECAUSE THEY ATE BAD LEAF:

Natural medicine is a fascinating topic and it carries a rich history of survival, culture and human history.

It is also a valuable source of insight for traditional medicine – it is often by searching the traditional, plant or nature based solutions and researching the active compounds on them that regular medicine can be crafted. These sciences are allies, they aren’t enemies, and the end goal is, always, to save lives.

HOWEVER it is NOT a replacement for traditional medicine. Traditional medicine works on isolating and amplifying components that are proven to be the source of the healing properties of plants and other things, both increasing the chances of obtaining a result and reducing the collateral effects, as well as monitoring people on a close and safe environment were any side-effects particular to that individual, caused by other pre-existent conditions, can be taken in consideration and dealt with by professionals. Dosage is also a very important factor that has to be considered. Doctors are equipped to deal with that. Everything can be a poison in excess.

By this, I mean to say if you go around using this info to justify selling mlm essential oils or being antivaxx I’ll personally haunt you once I’m dead. Natural medicine can be an interesting addition to conventional treatments if used responsibly, but it is not a replacement and is not to be used if you have no clue what you are doing. Please don’t go outside to eat random leaves and don’t trust random moms on facebook, their ‘research’ is far less than what I did for a tumblr post :’)

I can’t stress this enough: this is intended as a writing resource and not to be used in real life or as a guide. Don’t eat/use plants you don’t know. Please don’t. I’m also not a medical professional, I’m a plant nerd :)

And – a lot of this comes from oral traditions passed on by family. So shoutout to my grandma. Most of it is stuff you should be able to verify with a quick google search and I expent the day doing just that as well as gathering more info; I can link more trustworthy sources than Wikipedia if someone is interested, but they are mostly not in English.

ALSO, as a note: Popular plant names are NOT RELIABLE and vary greatly among regions, besides, they often are used to refer to a great number of species of the same genus; when in doubt always check the scientific name of the plant as that is standardized globally and taxonomists work hard to keep it concise.

Go to the doctor if you are sick please please please please please please please please please please please please please please :)

And just one more little note: I live in South America, that’s the flora I’m most familiar with. I know very little about European and Oceanic flora; but I reckon a lot of these might be similar to Asia and North America since a bunch of these plants are invasive species originated from Asia that have adapted well and spread around the continent.

Ok, first part is medicine second part is poison.

Some general info:

TO MAKE A BALM: You’d need some sort of animal fat or vaselin + a triturated mix of the correct plant parts and bee wax. Fat needs to be melted first, then you’d add the plant mix and lastly the bee wax; it needs to be constantly mixed until it gets the balm consistency and then filtered.

HOW TO MAKE A POULTICE: It’s basically just the mashed ingredients + something to make it slightly moisty; it largely depends on what it is exactly but it could be water, milk, coconut oil or animal fat. The paste is to be spread over a warm wet cloth and wrapped around the wound.

ON TEAS: A lot of the time you will need the fresh plant leaves and not the dried versions they sell on little sacks; Or they might both work, but likely to different things. Different parts of the plant might have different effects.

ACTIVATED CHARCOAL: It’s the go-to emergency poison retardant. It has the characteristic of being an adsorptive; this means other particles tend to cling to its surface and later be expelled with it. It can cause vomiting and nausea. Regular charcoal has been used historically for the same reasons. Eating the charcoal may interfere with other medications the person might be on.

A Few Non-Conventional Edible Plants and Medicinal Herbs:

-Pereskia aculetea: Popular names are lemonvine; blade-apple cactus; leaf cactus; rose cactus; fruits, flowers and leaves are edible and has high-nutritional value. Depending on how it’s prepared, the leaves taste somewhat like fish. The flowers are sweet, and can be used in baking cakes and pies. They have sharp thorns on the fruits and branches. It is a good emergency food-source as it causes a fulfilling sensation and can be consumed raw.

Tea made with the leaves is good for the intestinal flora. It is anti-inflamation and helps ulcers heal. Can be used externally if the leaves are triturated and mashed into a paste. The fruit is anti-oxidant;

Stanchys byzantina + some others of the genus: Known as Lamb’s ear. It’s cute and fluffy. It also tastes like fish if fried on butter. Making tea with the leaves can help with cough and throat irritation. Helps with stomachache and indigestion.

-Mentha sp. – MINT! Everyone loves mint. It smells nice and is fresh. It helps with colds and is effective against parasites such as giardia and amebas. The tea has to be made with fresh leaves for it to be effective, not dried ones.

-Arnica sp. – NOT EDIBLE AND CAN BE TOXIC IF INGESTED. Small amounts can be used as a spicy however is not recommended. However, it’s a very good topical painkiller; can be used as a balm, a poultice or on lack of other options, making a strong tea and infusing a clean piece of cloth on it then applying to the sore muscles can work.

-Calendula sp. – It’s edible but not exactly tasty, a little spice I’d say. A balm can be made from it that is very good on cuts and bruises.

-Begonia cucullata – Known as wax begonia. It’s all edible, but calcium rich so should be avoided by someone with kidney problems.

-Portulaca oleracea – The Poultice is good against acne and insect stings; helps with inflammation and tea can be used against intestinal parasites. Slightly cooked leafs can help with burns (1º degree burns, don’t apply on anything worse). The seeds are specially good against parasites. Leaves, flowers and seeds are edible.

-Conyza canadensis / bonariensis – The Horseweed. Leaves are edible. They taste spicy-ish. Can help treat hemorrhoids and diarrhea.

-Echinodorus grandiflorus: This one is common of wetlands and water proximity. The crushed rhizomes can be put over the skin to alleviate rashes and hernias. Tea made with the fresh leaves is a diuretic and laxative; is also good against throat inflammations. Cold tea can help with skin conditions as well. Leaves are very bitter, the rhizome is somewhat sweet.

-Hedychium coronarium: White-ginger-lily or garland flower; It is common on wetlands or near water sources. The rhizomes and flowers are edible (leaves aren’t), flowers usually consumed as sort of a jam and the rhizomes as flowers. Helps with throat inflammations and pain. Oil made from this plant can be slightly sedative.

-Cymbopogum winterianus: Citronella; or Lemon Grass. NOT EDIBLE. It’s super sticky to the touch, makes your hands sticky too and very easy to get cuts from it because the leaf blades are somewhat sharp. A poultice of the leaves can be used on cuts, but the better use for it is as a natural repellent. Mosquitoes and other insects hate this plant. Just by having it planted somewhere near is very unlikely they’ll approach; candles can be made from it and incenses too.

- Pampinella anisum – Commonly known as aniseed and actually easy to find as dried leaves or the seeds. The dry leaves tea help with cold and throat swelling. Poultices and the essencial oil can be good as a relaxant; Tea made from fresh leaves is good for insomnia, nausea and stomachache. Tea made with the seeds can be used against intestinal parasites; breathing the vapor helps clean a constipated nose.

-Plantago major – Probably the most common one on this list and one of the best. Called great plantain or broadleaf plantain. Leaves are diuretics; help against inflammations and help soothe stomachaches and diarrhea. Everything but the roots are edible. Tea helps with cold.

-Ilex paraguaiensis – Yerba-mate or just matte. Has a very good nutritional value. People drink the dried leaves tea like water in Brazil and it’s very good for cooking sweets. It is slightly stimulant(high caffeine teor) and highly antioxidant. The fruits and leaves are nutrient rich; can be good on fighting anemia; has some effect against caries inducing bacteria and is effective against certain types of fungi; it only grows in forested areas because it is very sensitive to sunlight.

-Xanthosoma sagittifolium – Arrowleaf Elephant’s Ear. Rhyzomes, leaves and haste are edible BUT ONLY IF COOKED. Tastes similar to spinach. When they are raw, they have oxalic acid and are somewhat toxic. Is somewhat good against fever. A fried leaf can be used as a wrap over burns.

-Hibiscus sabidariffa - Slightly sour tasted tea made from the leaves; have a diuretic effect. Can be used as a natural pigment on other foods.

-Pistia stratiores – Water lettuce. It looks like a lettuce and it floats. Can be consumed as a juice, infusion or used as a poultice on hernias. HOWEVER I’d recommend never using any found on nature. Floating plants are being studied as having absorbent qualities and helping filter toxins and heavy metals from water, so much so they can make part of sewage treatment.

Dangerous/Poisonous Plants:

General treatment idea: A very generic idea of how poisoning is treated would be the administration of activated charcoal and a gastrointestinal wash depending on how long ago has been the ingestion. Mucosa can be treated/washed with products like egg whites, milk and olive oil in small quantities. Eyes are washed with water and saline. Most poison’s don’t have antidotes, so everything else would be treating the specific symptons. Catheterization may be needed on cases where the urinal tract is paralyzed because it’s important to keep the person hydrated. Laxatives may also be used in cases where it is safe. Everything largely varies with the specifics of each compound. On many of them inducing vomit might be worse.

PLANTS:

Brugmansia spps.: Known as Angel Trumphet; Angel’s Tears or Snowy Angel’s Trumpet. This plant likes high-humidity, so in a dry climate, it might indicate proximity to water sources. The in-nature form of this plant is highly toxic; every part of it being leaves, flowers trunk or roots. Seeds and leaves are specially dangerous. Can induce a trance-like and delusional estate as well as induce visual and auditory hallucinations; can cause paralysis of smooth muscles, confusion, dry mouth, pupil dilation and paralysis of the eyes. Can lead to death; severity varying depending on part of the plant ingested as well as the age of the plant and hydration state. They start from 15 to 30 minutes after ingestion.

Euphorbia milii.: Known as Christ’s Thorn; Crown of Thorns or Christ Crown. Honestly this one’s strength is the aesthetic. It has thicc thorns, pretty red flowers and I’m pleading you all to put it on a Whumpee’s head. It’s a moderate poison compared to the others; Inside the whole plant there is a white latex substance that is toxic. It causes skin and mucosa irritation. It can cause severe stomach-ache. Can lead to blindness if non-treated eye contact occur. If ingested, can cause severe stomach-ache and ulcers. The latex is very sticky to the touch.

Dieffenbachia spp: Similar to the one above without the fun thorns.

Zantedeschia aethiopica: The Calla Lily. In contact with mucosa’s it causes swelling and irritations; feelings of burn, nausea, vomit and diarrhea; difficulty swallowing and can cause death by asphyxiation due to internal swelling of the digestive system that in turns compresses the pharynx. ALSO: This is not exactly widespread knowledge I think, but this plant is hallucinogen and like 2-3 years ago the tea has been used as kind of a drug around here. However, this plant does not work as other popular recreational hallucinogens; it causes damage to the central nervous system and even if used just once, the user might never recover from it. What I heard from people who did try it, is that the hallucinations tend to be really bad and on the negative side.

Cicuta maculata – If you want to be dramatic and die like Socrates I guess. Its poison was used for execution in ancient Greece.

Calladium spp. – It’s ALSO called Elephant’s ear. See what I mean by common names not being reliable? Irritation, pain and swelling of tissues. All parts of the plant are poisonous. If ingested can lead to death due to swelling of throat/tongue.

‘Curare’ – this is actually not just one plant, but a mixture of several made into poison for darts and arrows. The Strynchnos and Chondodendron genus are the most important. It was used for hunting, but considered bad practice on war. Causes paralysis of the external body and some of the main internal systems killing the prey by asphyxiation. The person responsible for producing the poison was very likely to die due to being exposed to toxic fumes, because it was needed to cook the tree-barks during two to three days. Someone hit by the poison can survive if artificial respiratory methods are available until the poison-effect passes.

Potatoes – I’m not even going to elaborate on this one but raw and green potatoes = bad; however cultivated potatoes are way less toxic than the wild variations and the most poisonous plant parts are the leaves;

Aesculus hippocastanum – A horse chestnut seed, bark, flower and nut can cause poisoning when consumed raw. Causes muscle twitching, weakness, loss of coordination; vomiting; kidney problems and stupor. It slows the formation of blood cloths and might worsen the condition of hemorrhagic wounds.

Agave sp. – The flowers are edible and the saps can be used for an alcoholic beverage. But the saps cause pain and burning in contact with the skin; it will also start to develop blisters soon after the exposure. The healed skin tends to remain sensitive and have reoccurring itchy for years after the contact. Ingesting the saps might be fatal.

Anemonoides nermorosa – Wood anemone. All parts of the plant contain protoanemonim, it can cause irritation and burning sensation to skin; ulceras on the mouth; vomiting blood and nausea.

OK that should be it for today, but it isn’t even the surface. If anyone wants to expand or correct something on this, I encourage you to do so. Just don’t eat the leaf. Please don’t.

Not all but some of the sources (again, not english): here; here; here; here; here; here; one that IS in english and a shoutout for wikipedia cause why the hell not and one to my grandma who is a lovely lady who hates just about everything in the world.

#whump writing #whump scenario #whump writing resource #whump #im ded

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olivershen · 3 years

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Are they even mammals? Do baby vamps drink milk? Cuz isnt one of the mammals thing to have body hair? Or do they have but its all those baby hairs no one sees???

The taxonomists have found my tumblr! This is like the platypus debate all over again.

#maybe they’re like platyuses #they just sweat milk through their skin

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botanyshitposts · 4 years

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pls explain the news in laymans terms 😭

okay lads buckle up, this is gonna be a long one. the paper is “A phylogenomic analysis of Nepenthes (Nepenthaceae)” from Murphy et al. i’m gonna link it here, and i encourage anyone interested to read it for themselves and draw their own conclusions, but otherwise i’m gonna give an overview as i understand it.

if you do not want to see 394023 words of in-depth carnivorous plant genetics content you should start scrolling now.

so. Nepenthes is a carnivorous plant family colloquially known as ‘asian pitcher plants’ or ‘monkey cups’. it’s one of the largest carnivorous plant families in the world, and without a doubt one of the most diverse, but we’ll get to that in a minute. these plants have pitchers that fill with fluid and digest bugs alive (important note in terms of nep anatomy 101: unlike venus fly traps or sundews, Nepenthes are passive traps and don’t move or curl up or anything, just sit and watch it all unfold). their range has china and korea on the northern edge, the tip of australia on the southern edge, and most of indonesia, the philippines, and most associated landmasses encompassed between. there are a couple outliers, but for the most part these are jungle plants with a vining growth form that weaves through trees and just….eats.

now, putting aside the fact that they’re carnivorous, one of the biggest points of Nepenthes is their diversity as a family. if anyone out there remembers the term ‘adaptive radiation’ from an intro bio class, Nepenthes is THE family of adaptive radiation. in addition to common species that grow everywhere in their range, these lads can be so specialized that there are species you can only find on single specific ridges on single specific mountains on single specific islands; as you can imagine, this makes them especially vulnerable to climate change, habitat destruction, and poachers.

the most obvious point of diversity here is the pitcher traps themselves: there are hundreds of different pitcher morphologies, ranging from special peristome adaptations to bizzare patterns and colorations to the addition of fang-like structures and symbiosis with bats, ants, and rodents. the list goes on. these lads are so specialized it’s unbelievable. one might think that, in terms of figuring out how these different species are related to each other, that it would be pretty obvious, since everything is so distinctive.

but there is a problem.

they fuck.

Nepenthes as a family is established to be one of the oldest carnivorous plant families, but the 200+ species identified over the years are suspected to be the result of very recent (in evolutionary time) modern radiation. one of the most common definitions of what a ‘species’ is that i see circulated is the idea that something is a species when it can no longer breed with another species, but it’s important to realize that this is one definition of what a ‘species’ is. in the case of Nepenthes, the knowledge that a bunch of scientists have decided they are different does not stop them.

it was hoped, with the advent of DNA testing, that maybe we would be able to assemble a semi-full map of how all these species relate to one another and how they came to be (a phylogenetic tree), but as it turns out the lads fuck so much between themselves and other Nepenthes species that figuring out how they became the species they became, even with DNA, is extremely difficult. ‘breeding complexes’ not too different than what i wrote about in the fern sex triangle post a while back are a very nepenthes-esque thing to have happen.

a quote from the paper:

“These uncertainties are not unique to Nepenthes but various factors make them important in this group: the frequency of natural hybrids and apparent lack of intrinsic reproductive barriers between taxa, the extent of intraspecific morphological variation and the reliance by taxonomists on the pitchers.”

in short, these plants have no control. they are not practicing safe sex. they are living lavishly in their own tropical jungle paradise with as much hedonism as a plant can muster as botanists try to connect how one pitcher might be the evolutionary origin of another while somehow all the pitchers are either functionally the same or radically different.

which brings us to this study. when people compare DNA, they’re rarely comparing the entire genome (although that can be done), but rather they identify a set of consistently mutable genes that are present across an entire subsection of life, and look at just those genes at just their locations on various chromosomes. instead of trying to find a couple genes fit to compare plants across the Nepenthes genus, as past studies did, this study took and applied a set of DNA probes developed previously to compare 353 genes present across the entire subkingdom of flowering plants.

as you can imagine, this provides a significantly larger set of data to work with. sure, it’s not perfect and this take will need more research to confirm (basing the entire Nepenthes phylogenetic tree off of a single study is a dangerous game, especially when things are so saucy in the forest), but it’s significantly better than the results past Nepenthes phylogenetic analyses generated, where researchers were able to see some general outlines and attempted to sort the genus into a few groups, but were ultimately unable to see where species themselves split and what their relations to each other were (you know, because of all the sex).

so. this paper:

-obtained samples from 151 different Nepenthes species from different collectors, herbariums, and conservatories. for those familiar with Nepenthes as a hobby, Andreas Wistuba might ring a bell; he contributed some samples from his plants to this study. otherwise, the KEW botanical gardens is more ubiquitously recognized donor.

-for more common species, more samples were taken from different places to account for different populations.

-another quote from the paper that i think is interesting on multiple levels: “We also include two unpublished species, N. sp. Anipahan and N. sp. taminii. The former, from Palawan, is discussed by McPherson (2011) and may be a synonym of N. leonardoi. The latter is an undescribed species from Sumatra that has been circulating amongst Nepenthes growers and resembles N. rhombicaulis but is perhaps distinguished by its leaves. Also sampled here are N. echinostoma Hook. f., a commonly collected plant usually considered a variant of N. mirabilis, and a sample we liken to N. angustifolia Mast., a species usually considered synonymous with N. gracilis.”

i mentioned earlier that previous molecular analyses done by other people were able to see a general outline but weren’t able to see anything more distinct; the results of this paper for the most part confirm these general outlines, which means that if nothing else we have strong support for the relationship the entire Nepenthes family has to other, more closely related plant families, which the paper resolves in this tree:

note that the above tree describes the family’s relation to various other families, followed by ‘Nepenthes clade 1′ and ‘Nepenthes clade 2′. these two clades contain most of the Nepenthes genus sampled; the six species shown in red, according to the results, are considered sister species to the entire rest of the genus, separate from those two clades.

now, what personally gets me the most excited here is the plant they confirmed as being the sister species to that subsection of sister species, effectively making it the outgroup to like, literally everything else: Nepenthes pervillei, from the republic of seychelles.

yeah. you know back at the beginning of this response when i said there were some exceptions to the Nepenthes habitat range? this would be one of those exceptions. the republic of seychelles is off the coast of africa, closer to madagascar than indonesia. to be fair, there are also Nepenthes along the eastern coast of madagascar, but because Nepenthes is so strongly geographically coordinated (this paper goes on to describe clades literally just named after the countries they’re in) this is pretty goddamn cool. this species got cut off in the middle of the ocean and now looks…….like a Nepenthes, but just off enough to be kind of weird (the biggest thing i realized just…staring at pictures of it is that it doesn’t seem to have wings down the front, which to be fair isn’t required of neps but makes it look super naked as a result). forbidden uncanny valley Nepenthes cast from the fuck zone. i love it.

the other main outgroup species (the sister species to all the ‘typical’ asian species, specifically, aka clades 1 and 2) they identified was Nepenthes danseri, which is native to waigeo island in indonesia (that’s in the fuck zone, for those keeping score at home) and, i would argue, has the same kind of thin-peristomed, simple-ribbed kind of look to it that pervillei has, but it definitely looks more traditionally Nepenthes-like.

now, with that, we really get into the meat of their results here. this is the full phylogenetic tree with all tested species laid out according to their results:

i….have no idea if tumblr will let you zoom in on this pic so im just gonna write down some notes.

the color-coded names on the tree to the right match their respective habitats down in the map on the bottom left, which is neat, but it’s also interesting to see how some of these species have apparently been fucking between islands. i know this is gonna be low-res but look at this swath at the top, some of what they’ve identified as being ‘clade 1′ (mostly common, widespread lowland species):

- man………. i mean, first of all i wanna point out the lone bicalcarata branches at the top #representing, having somehow maintained their chastity despite being the sexiest of the Nepenthes.

- hookeriana being the outgroup for ampullaria seems to fit well by adorable chubbiness factor alone.

- one thing that seems weird but not totally out of character is that halfway down in yellow we see mirabilis in multiple populations in yellow, then down from there a little ways we see different mirabilis populations in green and purple and red, all but N. echinostoma and N. orbiculate, which are both outgroups. i knew it was a common species, but for some reason i wasn’t expecting it to be like………that (there’s an entire second section of them in red just below where this screenshot cuts off). like, good for them.

going down the main tree, we get into clade 2, the more specialized highland species, which are always very exciting.

there’s my personal favorite, N. villosa:

not surprised at N. edwardsiana’s relation, because how else would you be able to achieve such absolutely enormous teeth, but N. macrophylla surprises me. it’s got good teeth, but both edwardsiana and villosa are like, TEETH, you know? i guess it makes sense that it split from villosa, though.

moving from that, VERY glad that the littlest known lad, N. argentii, made it on here. i know i’ve talked about argentii on this blog before, as the Nepenthes species that was so tiny the paper describing it’s discovery warned that population counts could be skewed by the plants ‘hiding under bushes’. their tinyness, which kills me every time i look at an image of them, is somehow weird in terms of being related to N. graciliflora, which is…..pretty normal sized. same with N. armin. makes me wonder how the hell they got so tiny.

of course we can’t leave out the group with the largest currently known species, N. attenboroughii. the hilarity of the smallest and largest Nepenthes species being a single clade apart, if not very distantly diversified down their respective evolutionary lines, is not lost on me.

N. palawanensis is a chonker, but i gotta say i wasn’t expecting it to be the sister species to the one and only megachonker, the plant literally famous for its sheer chonk. imagine being that overshadowed by your sibling.

on a more general note– the paper noted this, too –it’s interesting to see how the lowland species seem to be happier about jumping islands and being promiscuous than the highland species, which seem to clump together by location. i guess it’s not surprising, knowing how specialized some of these highland species can be; villosa, for example, is native to a single side of a single mountain, and is positioned so that the populations are hit by cool wind coming up from the sea. still, lowland species need hot and humid environments, and can be just as picky. it’s gotta be a matter of isolation.

anyway, there’s probably more i could talk about here but…man there’s a lot of data. the paper goes in-depth with how they constructed the more problematic branches, and trouble they had with some over others, confirming that we shouldn’t take this phylogenetic tree as 100% correct; things will almost certainly change or become clearer as more research is done, and phylogenetic trees in particular are known for being constructed and reconstructed time and time again.

still though, it’s like…to see these relationships at this resolution for the first time is just really fucking cool, man. this isn’t even all the species. i remember i went to a carnivorous plant conference two years ago now, and there was a lecture by researchers attempting to untangle the phylogeny of Nepenthes and coming up short aside from a low-resolution tree of some of the more major species and the relation of Nepenthes to other families, their science blocked by the sheer feral chadness on display in the tropical jungles encompassing the land between china and australia. like, i really just want to take a moment, as an end note, to appreciate that these plants fucked so much in the past couple million years that it took multiple major advancements in technology and the examination of hundreds of genes just to get an approximate look at the phylogeny. like, that’s an Isoetes level power move and im not over it

#Anonymous #long post #me reading a new nepenthes paper: *sight narrows into a tunnel* *writes for two hours*#nepenthes #carnivorous plants #asks #plont asks

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