🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🧪🌳🐝What was the Third Student Botany Festival like? See the highlights video on our YouTube channel! Lively, informative, scientific, FUN! www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmfO... #BUC2025 #plants #loveplants

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌳🌿🐝What do students who participated in Botanical University Challenge think of it? And, if you are a university student in the UK or Ireland keen on plants, why should you participate in BUC2026? Listen to their own words on YouTube! www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8vX...

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌳🐝 Botanical jokes; love them or sigh over them! Always have one in The Thymes. AI tried to interpret the currant one. botanicaluniversitychallenge.co.uk/the-thymes/ #BUC2026

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🧪🌳🐝 An amusing plant-oriebtated seasonal cartoon from UK satirical magazine. #BUC2026

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🧪🌳🐝The amazing team names are a feature of Botanical University Challenge. Where do they come from? Team Pain in the Grass from University of Portsmouth explain in latest issue newsletter The Thymes. #BUC2026 botanicaluniversitychallenge.co.uk/the-thymes/

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌳🐝 Latest newsletter about Botanical University Challenge is now available on our website. Book reviews, information about #BUC2026, memories of this summer's competition and festival ... botanicaluniversitychallenge.co.uk/the-thymes/

🌿🌱🌾🌍🌎🍄👻💮Ghost orchids! Named for appearance, and seasonal for Halloween! Epipogium aphyllum, totally relies on mycorrhiza, fungi around tree roots, for nutrition. Europe and Asia. Dendrophytax lindenii, epiphyte, no leaves but photosynthetic roots. Cuba and Florida only. Both dramatic!! #BUC2026

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌳🐝 Urban plants prefer to live alongside rich people! Result of surveys from around the world. #BUC2026 www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Latest issue newsletter of Botanical University Challenge now on our website. Read all about the incredibly tense 2025 competition semi-finals and final.Then relax with the student Botany Festival. The Vegetable Orchestra. Workshops. Garden visits. botanicaluniversitychallenge.co.uk/the-thymes/

Botanical University Challenge #BUC2026 is starting! For teams of degree students at UK and Irish univerities or Botanical institutions. Team from University of Nottingham already signed up! First rounds February 2026. @suzieoftraken.bsky.social @herbarium.bsky.social @drmgoeswild.bsky.social

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌿🍁🍂 Autumn festivals and customs include making corn dollies from the stems of wheat, rye, oats and barley. Now both traditional forms originating in specific localities and new ones. #BUC2025

🪾🍂🍁🌳🌱🌾🌸🌼 Autumn/fall leaves. Once everything useful stored by tree/shrub, leaf itself has to go. Cells change so leaf breaks loose easily. Abscission zone. Deciduous tree now ready for winter storms. #BUC2025

🪾🍂🍁🌳🌲🌼🌷🌱🌾🌹Leaves of deciduous trees change colour dramatically in autumn/fall. How? Why? Leaves contain coloured molecules needed for photosynthesis to capture light and power food supply to tree. Colder weather and shorter day length triggers changes. #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌳🐝How to get into Botany? We asked students at 3rd Botany Festival in August from 30 UK and Irish universities and other plant-focused institutions. Andre Parise can't remember; Brazilian Atlantic rainforest has always been around him! Now doing PhD at University of Reading. #BUC2025

🪾🍂🍁🌳🌲🌼🌷🌱🌾🌹Another interesting row of street trees. Acers going yellow for autumn, but one does not follow the rest. Why? Different variety? Location? Younger? Just being stubborn? #BUC2025 #autumncolour

🪾🍂🌳🌲🌱🌾🍁 Amazing autumn color from street trees in #Manchester. They look on fire! Acer sp. Other species trees still green leaves or yellow. Sensing and response to the environment. #BUC2025

🌱🪻🌹🌻🌺🌲🌴🌾☘️🪴Plants certainly inspire artists. Watercolour of nasturtiums by Phylis I. Hibbert, painted 1928. Displayed in The Harris, a magnificent museum in Preston, UK. theharris.org.uk Cabbage family (Brassicaceae). Leaves, flowers and fresh seed-pods are really tasty. #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🧪🌳🐝 What makes students study plants at university? Interest within family is often a big thing that gets them started, but then students find their own way. Listen to Lyd Taylor, Conservation Biology at University of Plymouth. In runner-up team, Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025.

Amazing to be able to compare semi-natural Swiss alpine grassland plant diversity data now, versus 1884 - 1931. More diverse then at all altitudes. Now it increases with altitude. Great Agroscope use of data destined for bin during rebuilding. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

🌱🌾🌍🌺🌳🌿🌲🥕🥦 Here's a past Botanical University Challenge question: The distinctive flavour of brown sauce is from tamarind. Which plant family is tamarind from? Five choices: Fabaceae, Polygonaceae, Rosaceae, Apiaceae, Brassicaceae. #BUC2025

The #Botany360 Graduate Research Fellowship Writing Panel recording is now available! Hear faculty & grad students share insider tips on writing strong applications. Watch: youtu.be/11L4M8AJ4YY?... Guide: botany.org/file.php?fil... ⚠️Remember: Always check the NSF GRFP site for the latest updates.

🌱🌾🌍🌺🌿🌲🌴Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025 Who was the first woman botanist elected #FRS to Royal Society? Agnes Arber - in 1946! Royal Society started 1663. Botany was major area of science. How many other women should have been elected over the centuries. Much wasted talent!

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🧪🌳🥜 Plant and fungi have so many close relationships: fungi making soil; mycorrhiza fungi feeding and being fed by plants; fungi recycling dead plants; fungi causing disease on plants. #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌺🌷🌿🌍🪳 How do students get into Botany. Santiago Castano Sirosi, University of Aberdeen team, winners of Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025 was inspired by plants around him as he grew up in Columbia. Need more lovely city plants in UK! We have some urban orchids!!

🌱🌾🌺🌷🌿🌍🪳 Result of team name competition announced at Botanical University Challenge 2025. Winner was Team 'Plantastic Five', University College Dublin. Runner-up Team 'Pain in the Grass', University of Portsmouth. All teams think of such great names! @drmgoeswild.bsky.social

🌱🌾🌺🌷🌿🌍🪳 Student Amy Beach, studying Plant and Soil Science at University of Aberdeen - and in team winning Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025 - on what got her into Botany. Influence of father, gardening and being around nature. @drmgoeswild.bsky.social

🌾🌿🌴🌳🌲🪻🌷🪾🍄🌍🧪Wonderful to have a street tree as UK Tree of the Year. The Argyle Street Ash. Looks in good health. We need many more street trees. #BUC2025

Discovered 2024, variety of dogbane plant from Japan, Vincetoxicum nakaianum, exudes scent of alarmed ants. This attracts flies to pollinate plant's flowers. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

🌱🌾🌺🌷🌿🌍🪳 Third Student Botany Festival August 2025. After a workshop about orchids, say 'hullo' to one in a glasshouse at Cambridge University Botanic Garden @cubotanicgarden.bsky.social #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌺🏵️🌳🌿🌏 Third student botany festival had undergrad & postgrad students from over 25 institutions, and botanical scientists. Gave students opportunity to talk with botanists they would not otherwise meet. Great for inspiration, contacts and realising there are #careerswithplants! #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌍🌏🌎🌳🌿🌲 What better way to explore a glasshouse full of exotic plants than with one of its curators? Part of workshop at Third Student Botany Festival 2025 in Cambridge University Botanic Garden @cubotanicgarden.bsky.social @drmgoeswild.bsky.social #BUC2025

Nurturing botany - what Botanical University Challenge is all about. Look for information in October about entering your team of degree-level students for #BUC2026. Institutions in UK or Ireland that havn't entered a team before, contact us for more information! botanicaluniversitychallenge.co.uk

🌱🌾🌍🌺🌿🌳🐝🌷3rd Student Botany Festival #BUC2025 was next to Cambridge Botanic Garden @cubotanicgarden.bsky.social. Excellent to make use of plants in it during workshops and just to admire!

Great suggestion for @inaturalist.bsky.social l (& other on-line systems). Add ID to others records! You do not have to be the national expert. Good advice on how to make use of your plant ID skill, however limited. Includes: can you distinguish a plant from an animal? Even that is useful!! #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌺🏵️🌳🌿🌏 Amazing number of enthusiastic students keen on #botany at Third Student Botany Festival; 94 from UK and Ireland. Thinking about #careerswithplants & here listening to @cieem.bsky.social @bsbicountries.bsky.social @spun.earth @drmgoeswild.bsky.social #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌺🏵️🌳🌿🌏Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025. After, 3rd Student Botany Festival. Included workshop on orchids. About 10% of the seed plant species, monocots, but so much diversity: colours, scents, sizes, habitats, lifestyles, fungal partners. Exciting to hear from an expert!

🌱🌾🌍🌺🌳🌲🌴🧪Why do people get into plants at university? Listen to James Ashford in his second year of B. Sc. Biology at University of Aberystwyth. Short answer: Fun and employment prospects. #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌍🌺🌏🌳🌎🐝Other ways people get into #botany are through family influence. Here Ellie Defty, now studying at University of Leeds explains how her mother's art led her to plants. One of the first team from Leeds to enter Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025 talking at 3rd Student Botany Festival.

🌱🌾🌍🌺🌏🌳🌎🐝How do people get into botany? Here's Sophie Ball, now studying Global Health at Royal Holloway University of London. She explains at 3rd Student Botany Festival what started her journey into plants. #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌿🌳🌲Botanical University Challenge 2025 winners are team Taxon Taxoff from University of Aberdeen. Their name has been inscribed on the trophy & is now on its way to them to treasure for a year. @newphyt.bsky.social @gpsep.bsky.social @bsbibotany.bsky.social @cubotanicgarden.bsky.social #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌿🧪🐝🪳🌷 Name 2025 winning team of Botanical University Challenge has now been inscribed on the Sid Thomas Trophy. Team Taxon, Taxoff from University of Aberdeen, Scotland. For information about this trophy, see Issue 3, The Thymes, newsletter BUC. botanicaluniversitychallenge.co.uk/the-thymes/

🪷🌹🌻🌱🪴🌾🌳🌿🌍 Plants growing for natural dyes on roof National Theatre in centre London, UK. To be used in costumes and staging for plays. www.theguardian.com/stage/2025/s...

🌱🌍🌎🌳🎼🎶Making a whistle from sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus) twig. Botanical knowledge helps with successful design and construction! Maybe will feature in October issue The Thymes, newsletter of Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025 !

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌿🐝 Third Student Botany Festival after Botanical University Challenge #BUC2025. Introduction to insects! Why? Where do many live, hover, display, eat but plants? Pollination by insects! Carnivorous plants eat insects!!

🌎🌱🌾🌳🌴🌸🌻🪾Plant physical responses to put off animals considering them for lunch. The animals may now be extinct, but the plants still have protection. Really interesting! #BUC2025

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌿🐝 3rd Student Botany Festival, held last week at @cubotanicgarden.bsky.social had so much for student plant lovers. Wonderful glasshouses.

🌱🌍🌾🌺🌳🌿🪳 Final thought-provoking lecture ended 3rd Student Botany Festival. Inspirational finale. Jonathan Silvertown, University of Edinburgh, 'Separating plant myth from plant science'. jonathansilvertown.com #BUC2025

Glowing houseplants, not involving GM or other genetic changes. Would they be acceptable in UK or EU?

🌱🌾🌍🌺🍄🌳🪳🌲Excitement at The Botanical Society of Scotland as the team 'Taxon, Taxoff' from University of Aberdeen win Botanical University Challenge against 30 other university student teams from Scotland, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Wales & England. #BUC2025 botsoc.scot/2025/08/27/b...

“Computer modelling predicts that levels of nature connectedness will continue to decline unless there are far-reaching policy and societal changes – with introducing children to nature at a young age and radically greening urban environments the most effective interventions.”