NEWSLETTER - December 11, 2005

UPCOMING MEETINGS

January 8, 2005, 3:00 pm

at Rock Quarry House, program to be announced.

An orchid by any other name: Asparagus?

The New York Times

NEW YORK -- Orchids can be elegant, gaudy, lurid and even downright bizarre. While the unusual flowers of these species have excited plant lovers for centuries, they have also made it difficult for evolutionary biologists to place them in the plant family tree and identify their closest relatives. Now, scientists say, studies of the DNA of orchids are revealing a host of surprises, chief among them, that orchids are actually part of the asparagus group, closer kin to these vegetables than to the other, flashier, flowering plants they had been placed with before.

“They’re so weird, so different from everything else,” said Dr. Ken Cameron, orchidologist at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx.

At the same time, scientists are finding that orchids, long thought to be the recent product of plant evolution, are actually quite ancient, having emerged more than 90 million years ago. It is often easy for experts to pick out an organism’s closest relatives, but sometimes -- as with orchids -- appearances can point in many directions and no direction at all.

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LAST MEETING

Twenty-something members attended the last meeting on Sunday, November 13, 2005, at 3:00 P.M., at Rock Quarry House.

Scott Samuels, Hal and Melba Shaffer, Howard Wilson and Barbara Giles all brought plants for Show-and-Tell. Many thanks for the wonderful treats provided by Bea Smith and others

Darla Manly of Allen’s Flowers introduced us to ikebana style of flower arranging and produced a stunning arrangement in seemingly effortless fashion. Also provided examples of how to spruce up the presentation of our orchid plants when they are in and out of bloom. She generously supplied all of us with a couple “starter” plants have on hand to use as accents in arrangements. Hopefully this provided some inspiration for members to experiment with the presentation of their plants and flowers.

Thanks, Martha Routier, for taking pictures at the last meeting!

CENTRAL MISSOURI ORCHID SOCIETY Newsletter - December 11, 2005 Page 2

NEXT MEETING

The next meeting will be held on Sunday, December 11, 2005 at 3:00 P.M. at the Samuels’ house in Ashland. Please call Barbara 999-7833 or Howard 874-1772 to arrange carpooling. See map below. Scott Samuels has had lots of success growing plants with window growing conditions so this will be a good opportunity to see another grower’s set up. We will discuss and compare what works and what doesn’t for growers with similar conditions or those wanting to establish similar growing conditions.

We are very fortunate to have a member make the extra effort to open their house for us during this busy time of year so you are all encouraged to attend and bring any interested friends and family. This is a great opportunity to get into the holiday. spirit (and tummy bulge) by eating yummy treats. Feel free to bring a favorite dish if you’d like!

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One problem is that orchid flowers have undergone striking evolutionary elaborations, evolving myriad forms and devices, sometimes to entice very particular animal pollinators. In the process, elements of flower structure that may have pointed to the group’s evolutionary history have been distorted or lost. One particular oddity of orchid flowers is their highly unusual reproductive structure, the normally separate array of reproductive parts having evolved to be fused together inside a typical orchid bloom. “You look inside an orchid, and say, ‘Where are all the parts?’” said Cameron. “It doesn’t look like anything else.”

By looking at DNA, researchers were able to free themselves from limits of vision. Comparing instead a wide variety of genes both among the orchids and between orchids and the other flowering plants, Cameron and colleagues found that the orchids fell squarely within the so-called Asparagales, the group that includes asparagus. “People found it hard to believe,” Cameron said. But the Asparagales is large and diverse, containing amaryllis, onions, irises, daffodils as well as agaves and yuccas. Scientists say the evolutionary history of orchids has also been obscured by the oddities of their pollen and seeds.The pollen of most plants is nearly indestructible and many plant seeds are extremely tough, providing perfect material to be preserved in the fossil record. By contrast, the pollen and seeds of orchids are typically extremely delicate.

“Unlike any other group of plants,” said Dr. Mark Whitten, a botanist at the Florida Museum of Natural History, “there just isn’t any reliable fossil record. With other groups you can find a fossil and conclude that the group must be at least that old or older. But with orchids it’s been pretty much sheer speculation.” Now, when DNA data are used to build an evolutionary tree of the plants, they show that orchids branch off fairly early, the first among the Asparagales plants, meaning they are the oldest in that group. Orchids also branch off before the palms. Because there are palm fossils that are 90 million years old, scientists know, orchids must be at least that old.
Central Missouri Orchid Society http://cmos.misssouri.org