Urban species walk right up to me

Last night, during my class, a spider walked up onto my notebook. I'm sure it's the same kind that we often encounter in our kitchen, and I photographed in our hallway. Seen in person they look yellowish, but in my photo it looks brown. I need to find a good spider key to figure these guys out. I started to take a picture of the one on my notebook, but I got self-concious when my camera made its little "I'm focused!" beep. Behind the cut is the one that was in our hallway.

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365 Urban Species. #103: Common Blue violet

photos by cottonmanifesto

Common blue violet. Viola sorora

Imagine my horror when I decided that violet would be a good urban species to cover, only to discover there are over 500 species (more than Rhododendron!). Fortunately, a brief look at the literature confirms what I suspected: most of the time we see violets in the city we're seeing a single species, Viola sorora. Violet is the weed that is rarely considered a weed. They produce a lovely flower (that can be either white or purple), form a nice ground cover, and, as a bonus, are safe to eat. Violet flavored gum and candy used to be fairly widely available. Violets have been cultivated into countless varieties of pansies. The field pansy, or Johnny jump-up, is a European wildflower occasionally encountered as an urban species.

The distinctive five-petaled flower of the violet is a combination target and landing pad for pollenating insects. Violet is the state flower of the most densely populated state, New Jersey, the very densely populated state of Rhode Island, and the states of Wisconsin and Illinois.

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365 Urban Species will return after a brief suspension of service.

We leave tomorrow for a little over a week. Our internet access will be inconsistent. I may fall behind on the 365 project, but I should catch back up shortly after our return. I apologize for the interruption, but boy do I need this vacation!

Be well, nature lovers.