Symbolism

It's been an interest of mine to look at the symbolism of the dandelion - both historically and in a contemporary context. I've noticed that the use of dandelions in contemporary design will almost always only use the seed-head, but hardly ever the flower. Perhaps the flower is considered just too vulgar and common to inspire reproduction (maybe the old belief that touching dandelions will cause bed-wetting doesn't especially help), where as the seed-head is seen as delicate and beautiful: representing time passing - seeds gently floating along on the spring breeze etc...
In folk stories blowing on a dandelion seed-head will determine what time it is, how long you will live, when you will marry (this year, next year, sometime, never) and how many children you'll have etc.

I've seen seed-head designs on t-shirts, greeting cards, coasters, mugs, as stencils for DIY home decorating, on wrapping paper, and on textiles.

I recently received this email form my friend Pat:

Hi Rebecca
Have you seen this design by Royal Copenhagen?
We were in Keswick last weekend in a cafe having lunch. There was a gallery above the cafe and I went upstairs with my friend to have a browse. There was this vase with the dandelion design - £635!! I told my friend and the lady in the shop about your project - she very kindly cut the pages from her catalogue so that i could give it to you. The design is very unusual and what surprises me most is that the flower doesn't feature - just the seed-head and the leaf. Apparently it is quite an old design and has been produced for years.
Regards
Patricia

I have found a dandelion leaf in a design on a Mornflake Superfast Oats packet - only the leaf and not the flower or seed-head (it's in the background along with oats, honesty, ribwort plantain, wild carrot, shepherd's purse, goosegrass, hogweed and a vetch).

Historically the dandelion is St Brigid's flower. Brigid is one of Ireland's earliest recorded saints and along with St Patrick is one of Irelands most famous saints. It is thought she was born sometime between 452 and 456 CE in Faughart near Dundalk in Co. Louth.
It's believed she died on 1st February 524 - so her feast day is celebrated every year on the 1st February. The dandelion is known at St Brigid's flower because it is the first flower of spring.
As it goes, I haven't found an image of St Brigid that shows a dandelion too - i'm still searching.

The dandelion lights its spark
Lest Brigid find the wayside dark.
And Brother Wind comes rollicking
For joy that she has brought the spring.
Young lambs and little furry folk
Seek shelter underneath her cloak.

Winifred Mary Letts (1882 - 1972)

With further searching i've found that the dandelion also symbolises desire, sympathy, affection returned and can mean love me.
Finding out what it symbolises in Japanese culture has proved a little harder, but it seems to mean similar things: faithfulness, happiness and is also known as love's oracle.

YSP

I spent the last two days at Yorkshire Sculpture Park looking for bumblebees (I'm doing a residency there over the next year looking at native bee species - bumble and solitary - plus we are setting up bee hives to observe honey bees too).

I managed to collect dandelion leaves on both days for the dandelion diary, plus I got this close up shot of a dandelion just beginning to open up.

I have a blog for that project too (because i have nothing better to do with my time):

www.chesneybeeproject.blogspot.com

First Dandelion

I decided to skive work this morning with the weather being so mild and sunny and spent a couple of hours at my allotment.

On the way there I went through Avenham Park alongside the Ribble. I saw my first dandelion flower in full bloom facing the sun. There was also lots of Coltsfoot flowers, a few Daffodils and a lot of Ramsens coming up already. There was a solitary dandelion in full bloom in Miller Park by the Ribble under the Chestnut tree avenue the council have just massacred (diseased my arse). It looked very lonely in all the devastation.

Incredibly I also saw two House Martins - my first of the year. It seems very early to me.

The dandelion leaves here are from Avenham Park. I did get a shot of the dandelion in flower - only i took it on my crappy Lomo and i expect it'll take months before i develop the film, plus no doubt it'll be blurred too.

Japanese Dandelion Definition

I found this definition to help me find Japanese dandelions while i'm there:

Family: Asteraceae
Genus: Taraxacum
Species Epithet: japonicum

Kansai-tanpopo. Dandelion

Perennial herbs. Leaves, oblanceolate or linear-lanceolate, 10 - 30 cm long, 3 - 5 cm wide, entire or variably lobed, usually with 5 or 6 pairs of triangular lateral lobes, sometimes pinnatifid to pinnatipartite; petiole green, sometime reddish, with or without a wing. Flowers March to May. Scape green or reddish, densely floccose at base of head. Head 2 - 3cm in diam., with 30 - 100 florets (average 80). Involucre green or dark green, 12 - 15 mm long at flowering. Exterior bracts appressed, 2/5 - 3/5 as long as involucre, densely villose on margin, with or without a small corniculate appendage to ca. 1.5 mm long; outermost bracts oblong-lanceolate to ovate-oblong, 3 - 5 mm long, 1.5 - 2.5 mm wide. Ligules yellow, 15 - 16 mm long, 2 - 2.5 mm wide. Style and stigma black. Pollen uniform in size and exine structure. Achenes mostly straw coloured, rarely dark brown, ovate, 3 - 3.5 mm long, ca. 1.5 mm wide, apex spinulose and tuberculate, smooth near base, cone conical, 0.5 - 0.8 mm long. Beak 5 - 8 mm long. Pappus white, 5 - 7 mm long. Sexual.
Sunny ruderal habitats such as roadsides and edges of paddy fields; below 500m.

Very helpful - thanks.

The image here is of a British dandelion (not Japanese). Hopefully i'll come back from my trip with lots of new images of Japanese dandelions.

Japan Prep

I ordered my Japan Rail Pass today - in exactly 4 weeks I go on my trip to Japan.

I also got my spare battery for my camera in the post today, so I won't need to worry that it goes flat during the trip while i'm taking thousands of shots. I'm going to take my Polaroid SX70 too (my favorite camera) - plus if i have room i might take my pinhole 100 (but it's quite bulky and i might leave it at home). I've ordered films for it ready, in case i take it. You can't have too many cameras...

All my accommodation is booked too. Kyoto was the most difficult to find somewhere (i wanted a small ryokan) with it being blossom season - but after a day of emailing enquiries out i have found one near the station.

There's still a bit of planning to do, but i'm nearly there.

Spring

I just got back from a 2 hour session of digging up weeds on the allotment.

It's been a lovely week - sunny weather and blue skies - and all the plants are beginning to come up - the celandines are already in flower in the park and there was a pretty little daisy on the allotment (i didn't have the heart to pull it up, so it's still there). As I walked along the bank of the Ribble I saw my first dandelion bud ready to burst open. All the dandelions are growing and getting stronger - it won't be long now....

I don't seem to have any photos of dandelion buds and I didn't have my camera with me - so this image doesn't really match.

Place Beyond Place Symposium

Tanpopo Tour of Preston 28th April 2010

I have been asked to lead one of the artist tours of Preston city in the afternoon of the symposium.

The Place Beyond Place Symposium has been developed by In Certain Places for urban planners, artists, public art commissioners, architects, urban designers and people with an interest in the future of cities.

The morning will feature presentations by artist and founding director of cSPACE Lorain Leeson and geographer Tim Creswell, Professor of Human Geography at Royal Holloway, University of London.

My Tanpopo Tour will take you round the weed hotspots of the city revealing how plant species from all around the world have come to settle in the city.

To find out more and to book your place please go to the Place Beyond Place website.

Clever Witches

I found this info on the Leicester Pagan Alliance website:

'Herbal knowledge is a powerful tool. It was necessary for witches centuries ago who possessed such knowing, to disguise the names of their ingredients so, should their sacred journal fall into the wrong hands, without the corresponding Herbal Code to decipher the true meaning of the herbal ingredients, spells, potions and medicines would be useless'

So, with this in mind, witches used 'Lions Tooth' instead of Dandelion.... how cunning.

Please see Name Calling in the post below.

Name Calling

It's not clear which part of the Dandelion was the source of its name - it could be the jagged leaves resembling the teeth of a lion, or the whole jaw of a lion; the yellow flower resembling the mane of a lion or the golden teeth of the heraldic lion.

Dandelion is a corruption of the French Dent de Lion. It's former scientific Latin name was Dens leonis and Linnaeus assigned it the name Leontodon taraxacum. Taraxacum is derived from the Greek taraxos (disorder) and akos (remedy). It's scientitic name is now Taraxacum officinale assigned by Weber. Officinale is from the Latin officina meaning pharmacy.

Different European countries use the Lion's tooth name too:

Diente de león - Spanish
Dente-de-leão - Portugese
Dente di leone - Italian
Löwenzahn - German
Løvetann - Norwegian
Løvetand - Danish
Dant y Llew - Welsh

There's also masses of local names: Swine's Snout, Blowball, Irish Daisy, Lion's Tooth, Priest's Crown, Canker Wort, Clocks and Watches, Devil's milk plant, Fairy Clock, Fortune Teller, Pee in the bed, Piss-a-bed, Puffball, Wet-a-bed, Wild Endive.

He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not

I finally finished the book of seeds i've been working on.
It's 32 pages of little dandelion seeds in fine black pen.
In total there are 2560 seeds in the book.

Peter Scott Gallery

It was the opening of Conversations with the Collection exhibition on Tuesday night. I was asked to look through the collection at the Peter Scott Gallery at Lancaster University and choose a piece of work that I could then partner with a piece of my own work.

We (I went with fellow artists Elaine Speight and Robina Llewellyn) weren't actually allowed to rummage through the real collection, but could look through massive catalogues listing each item. I picked a Chinese fan that showed a couple of butterflies with spooky eyes and there's a wonderful dandelion on it too. The flowers are faint but the leaves are really clear. I was chuffed to find a dandelion in the collection.

So I partnered it with a piece that I was still working on and finished for the exhibition. It's a piece of black bed sheet embroidered with synthetic gold thread. I've stitched a row of 16 dandelion leaves on it - all different. The finished piece is 129 x 37 cm.

The image here is a detail.

The exhibition runs until 20 May
Admission free
Mon - Fri 11am - 5pm
& Sat 11am - 4pm

Dandelions 1653

Culpeper's Complete Herbal - And English Physician Enlarged

Nicholas Culpeper was an apothecary, physician and astrologer. He wrote several works, but it's his Herbal that is the most famous and was first published in 1653.

The entry for dandelion is quite long which includes description; place; time and government and virtues sections.

"DANDELION, VULGARLY CALLED PISS-A-BEDS

Descript.] It is well known to have many long and deep gashed leaves, lying on the ground round about the head of the roots; the ends of each gash or jag, on both sides looking downwards towards the roots; the middle rib being white, which being broken, yields abundance of bitter milk, but the root much more...
Place.] It grows frequently in all meadows and pasture-grounds.
Time.] It flowers in one place or other almost all the year long.
Government and virtues.] It is under the domination of Jupiter. It is of an opening and cleansing quality, and therefore very effectual for the obstruction of the liver, gall and spleen, and the diseases that arise from them, as jaundice the hypocondriac; it opens the passages of the urine both in young and old; powerfully cleanses imposthumes and inward ulcers in the urinary passage; and by its drying and temperate quality doth afterwards heal them; for which purpose the decoction of the roots or leaves in white wine, or the leaves chopped as pot-herbs, with a few Alisanders, and bolied in their broth, are very effectual. And whoever is drawing towards a consumption or evil disposition of the whole body, called Cachexia , by the use hereof for some time together, shall find a wonderful help. It helps also to produce rest and sleep to bodies distempered by the heat of ague fits, or other wise. The distilled water is effectual to drink in pestilential fevers, and to wash the sores. You see here what virtues this common herb hath, and that is the reason the French and Dutch so often eat them in Spring; and now if you look a little farther, you may see plainly without a pair of spectacles, that foreign physicians are not so selfish as ours are, but more communicative of the virtues of plants to people."

I felt like I was coming down with a mild case of evil disposition the other day - if i'd known white wine and a few dandelions could have saved me - i would have given it a go.

Dandelions 1597

Gerard's Herbal - Of the Historie of Plants

In 1597 John Gerard, the Elizabethan physician who superintended the gardens of Lord Burleigh in the Strand, first published Of the Historie of Plants. The first edition is seldom quoted, for the enlarged second edition, by Thomas Johnson, of 1633 was far better (there was over 1000 corrections made to the first edition). It was due to Johnson that the Herbal continued for a long time to be the standard work for English students.*

This is the entry for dandelion:

"The hearbe which is commonly called Dandelion doth send forth from the root long leaves deeply cut and gashed in the edges like those of wild Succorie, but smoother: upon every stalke standeth a floure greater than that of Succorie, but double & thicke set together, of colour yellow, and sweet in smell, which is turned into a round downy blowbal that is carried away with the wind. The root is long, slender, and full of milky juice, when any part is broken, as is the Endive or Succorie, but bitterer in tast than Succorie.
They are found often in meadowes, neere unto water ditches, as also in gardens and high wayes much troden.
They floure most times in the yeare, especially if the winter not be extreme cold."

*I've used information written by Marcus Woodward in 1927 from the introduction to my copy of Gerard's Herbal.

I dissected the flower head of a dandelion and the drawing above is of the individual parts. The original drawing is A2 size.

Little Winter Dandelions

Yesterday I went to the Peter Scott Gallery in Lancaster (at the University) to install a piece of work for an exhibition that starts next week.

It was a cold day with brief snow showers, but I still wanted to find a couple of dandelion leaves for the dandelion diary. Although surrounded by fields, the campus is a fairly brutal concrete mini city with hardly any planted areas. Right outside the Main Hall entrance is a raised bed imaginatively planted up with grass, so the dandelions pictured here are from there. The leaves are tiny.

In winter I can still find dandelions, but they are little, hardy, low-lying things struggling to hold on over the cold months.

Coronation Street

I don't know whether you've noticed, but when there's a double episode of Coronation Street, when the first one has finished and it says 'Coronation Street continues in half an hour' they often have a screen shot with a fantastic close-up of a dandelion on a back street.

(apart from last night acutally as it was an episode where Gail the chinless wonder and her husband, whatshisname - you know the one whose daughter used to go out with evil David (Gail's son) and I think she still works in The Cabin with Rita (where did Rita go?) go on a trip to the Lakes and he (Gail's husband) tries to fake his own death, quite successfully, I'd say. Oooh, poor Gail.)

The image here isn't from Coronation Street, if you're wondering, but another of my test cyanotypes with a dandelion form my backyard.

Rubber

In January I got this email from Dr Christine Guth:

Dear Rebecca

A very happy new year to you!
I hope you are making good progress on your Japanese dandelion research. Perhaps you have already come across this information, but the January 2 issue of the Economist has an interesting article on a Russian variety of dandelion that may prove to be a new source of rubber! It's in the science and technology section, and naturally, when I read it, I thought of you!

All best
Christine

Funnily enough my subscription to Economist had just run out, so I hadn't read it. But Muffy's mum had told me the same thing earlier (see post USA Connection).
Here is the opening paragraph from the article in Economist:

Tremble, Michelin, Tremble.

Other than being an ingredient of the more recherche sorts of salad, herbal tea or wine, dandelions are pretty useless plants. Or, at least, they were. But one species, a Russian variety called Taraxacum kok-saghyz (TKS), may yet make the big time. It produces molecules of rubber in its sap and if two research programmes, one going on in Germany and one in America, come to fruition, it could supplement - or even replace - the traditional rubber tree, Heevea brasiliensis.

Incidental

I went to London in December to look in the collections at the V&A and also the British Museum. I wanted to see if I could find the representation of dandelions in any of the objects on display.

I spent a whole day looking through the V&A collections: what a treat! I think I must have walked about 27 miles (and consequently came down with a severe case of 'gallery foot ').

I felt like I was on an expedition looking for specimens in an unlikely landscape.

I found a few dandelions in the collection - a tiny one on a medieval painting (no flower, just the leaves); one in bloom in the background of a huge tapestry; and the best was on a Japanese lacquered box.

The Japanese box was the jewel of my finds: it was getting towards the end of the day and I had scrutinised so many objects by then, and the two I'd already found were incidental background additions. The Japanese one was deliberate, beautiful and delicate. It was made by Ikeda Taishin and is a lacquered box for writing utensils dated 1870 - 1900. What a beautiful specimen and on a Japanese object too - it fits so well into my research so far.

I did take snapshots of the work, but I doubt I can post them on my blog - you'll just have to go on a trip and discover them for yourself.

While I was in London I was staying with my friend Neil. He studied at the V&A and he set up a meeting for me with Dr Christine Guth who works at the museum. Her particular field of study is Japanese design history so we had a lot to chat about and I had many questions for her. It was great to talk to her about the dandelion project and hear her thoughts and suggestions for reading material, people to contact and places to visit.

I was in London for a few days and on my return to Euston Station on the last day I decided to pop into the British Museum for a couple of hours. Obviously that's not even nearly enough time to explore the collection especially when its teaming with visitors (how inconvenient). So, I went straight to the Japanese collection. There on a vase, with two doves annoyingly blocking the view, was a pretty little dandelion! It is a vase by Namikawa Sosuke and made in around 1897. How exciting! No, really - I think that's exciting.

So my expedition to London went really well and I came away refreshed, inspired and with lots of stuff to think about.

Apomixis

"Dandelions are not like most other plants. Within the British Isles, virtually all dandelions reproduce apomictically, that is they produce seed asexually, each seedling usually being an exact copy of its mother. Sexual reproduction in dandelions, if it occurs at all, is very rare in our islands"
AA Dudman & AJ Richards Dandelions of Great Britain and Ireland

USA Connection

I emailed Muffy's mum, Mary (who lives in USA). I told her about the dandelion project and this is her reply:


Dear Rebecca

We have several kinds of dandelions here. The most prominent one is the common dandelion, taraxacum officinale, which was brought here by the early colonists from Europe. It was used for food, medicine and wine and was an important ingredient to their livelihood. Its popularity has waned through the centuries and is now an invasive plant, disliked by the majority.

I have always had an interest in dandelions and have studied every facet of their makeup and history. Healthwise, they contain vitamins and minerals galore! The leaves, blossoms, and roots are all edible, as well as medicinal. Each plant is a supermarket in itself. A few people still raise it for a vegetable and we have one town in Maine that has a canning factory that cans the leaves as greens, in the spring, when they are young and not bitter. A town in the state of New Jersey has a Dandelion Festival every spring. Farmers raise acres of dandelions and everyone gets into the spirit and helps with the preparations. Dandelions are prepared in every way you could imagine including deep fried blossoms, salads and lasagne!

The Russian dandelion, kok-saghyz, came to the United States during World War II. It has a much larger root with more latex. When the Japanese cut off our rubber supply, Russia sent us seeds of their dandelion so we could make our own rubber supply as they were doing. After the war, the plants were destroyed because it was not feasible when we could get back to our own rubber supply. That is another whole story that I have recorded for history.

Now I would like to hear about the printing side of the plant! I have rolled a brayer covered with paint over the underside of the leaves to get prints for teaching purposes, but that is my only experience in that direction!

I wonder if the invasive dandelion in Japan is the same as our common dandelion which came from England with the early settlers?

It was nice to hear from you.

Mary

Artlab and Connections

When I was chatting with Lubaina Himid at the Centre for Contemporary Art in Preston, she suggested I might consider joining the Artlab Contemporary Print Studio based at the University of Central Lancashire.

Unless you count potato printing and a few attempts at lino cuts, i've never really done any printing. But, I thought i might be able to experiment with print while developing the dandelion project further.

Going to Artlab and learning this new skill has taught me a number of things:

1. I should have more patience - i'm not going to become a master printer within the anticipated 6 months (or 6 years for that matter)
2. It is unlikely that I will ever produce a run of prints numbering more than 3
3. I should have more patience - turning up and working for 4 hours does not guarantee going home with one good print
4. I have to look after my copper plates better - inexplicable scratches seem to mysteriously appear from nowhere
5. I should have more patience

One of the best things about going to Artlab has been meeting and chatting with other members in the group.
While chatting about the dandelion project with one fellow Artlab member called Muffy she mentioned that her mum, living in USA, was also really keen on dandelions and is on the board of the Pine Tree State Arboretum in Maine. She gave me her email address and we've been in contact.

The image here is the first print i'm happy to show - the first few were truely crap.

Sewing and TV

I decided a while ago that I watch far too much TV in the evenings and I could be doing more productive things - like making art.

When I was little my mum showed me how to sew (both my parents sew for a living) and although I haven't done any for years I thought this would be a good way to spend time while still watching television (I couldn't quite give it up).

Spending hours stitching the outlines of dandelions has made me look so much closer - how intricate, delicate and variable this overlooked weed can be.

Missed Opportunities

I went to Yorkshire Sculpture Park yesterday for a meeting and I was there from just before 11am until 3.30pm

It was one of those days where I really wanted to collect a couple of dandelion leaves, but things conspired against me and I came away empty handed. I was quite disappointed.

I've been to a few places in the past where I didn't have time to look for leaves, or sometimes I'm just too embarrassed to bob down in front of people i'm with (who don't know about the project) and come back up clutching two battered looking leaves.

On the way home yesterday I did have time in Leeds to leave the station and go along the river to find the two shown here. I saw a couple of Goosanders on the river too. That's nice.

Centre for Contemporary Art

The Centre for Contemporary Art is based at the University of Central Lancashire in Preston, Lancashire and is the home base for a large group of research projects. It is led by Lubaina Himid, Professor of Contemporary Art and I met with her last year to chat about the dandelion project and how I could and should start to archive my collection.

Why and how would I put an order to this ramdom collection of stuff i've collected over the past few years (i've also been collecting other bits of wildlife - dead bees, wasps, butterflies, spiders - but that's a whole new blog i think).

How will I decide to categorise and label everything? I keep wondering why i'm doing this - if there isn't a botanical use for my dandelion collection, how else, if at all, will it be used?

Freestyle archiving might be the way to go I think.

The image here is by Cecile M Driffield from a book by Gareth H Browning published in 1938 called Botany For Fun. Surely there should be a question mark on the end of that title.

Some Locations

The dandelion diaries track where i've been throughout each year.
I've collected dandelion leaves from many different locations (in no particular order) :

Aberdeen, Barrow, Burnley, Toronto, Blackburn, Budapest, Berlin, Lancaster, Birmingham, Niagra, Munchen, Carnforth, Castlefield, Hebburn, Chorley, Leeds, Ulverston, Wigan, Amsterdam, Wirral, Lytham-St-Annes, Runcorn, Riedlingen, Warton, Morecambe, Preston, Nottingham, Harrogate, Uffing, Edinburgh, Manchester, London, Galgate, Eccleston, Sigmaringen, Gateshead, Liverpool, Clitheroe, Grasmere, Heysham, Coniston, Haworth, Castleford, Pendle and Penwortham. Plus a few others that aren't near any specific village / town / city.

All the collected dandelions are from particular spots in these places: friends gardens and back yards, museums, galleries, campsites, parks, my allotment, named streets, and alongside roads and rivers while taking walks.

Permission

As I am planning to collect dandelion specimens while i'm in Japan and bring them back to UK, I thought i'd better check that it is allowed. So I sent an email to Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs). This is their reply:

Ref:DWOE000153199
Dear Ms Chesney

Thank you for your email of 1 October.

Pressed and dried flowers are not Plant Health restricted. You will be able to bring the dandelions into the UK without Plant Health documentation providing they are free from pests.

I hope this is helpful.

Yours sincerely,

LW*
Customer Contact Unit
Defra


I'm pleased and quite relieved about this as I've collected specimens from other countries before and not sought permission until now. Good job it's OK then.

The image above is of my flower press made by Stephen (he used to work at Bolton Museum and made it for the poison project). I have 3 other presses: 2 made by my dad and 1 made by Mick.

*The sender gave their full name, but i thought it polite to use their initials instead.

Research Funding

At the begining of 2009 I was talking with my friend Charles (my unofficial mentor) about the dandelion project and the research I had started and the connections i'd found with Japan. He encouraged me to think about applying for funding towards the project. After wrestling with an application for months - trying to articulate the aims, methods and possible outcome - I put it in for consideration in spring 2009 and waited. And waited.

3 months later I heard from Arts Council England : they had awarded me funds to go on a research trip to Japan to look at dandelions. How exciting!

So, my plan is to go to Japan to look for both Japanese and European dandelion specimens and also to look in museum collections to see if I can find the representation of dandelions in Japanese material culture.

Owen (the botanist) visited me in December for the weekend and he brought with him a massive book on the flora of Japan. There are over 20 species of Japanese dandelions and we decided the best time for me to go is in April. So, i've booked my flight for mid-April.
I fly to Tokyo, then i'm travelling to Hiroshima and to Kyoto, before returning to Tokyo. In this time I want to visit as many museum collections and botanical gardens as I can and to also try and collect specimens.

It happens to be the cherry blossom season while i'm there - bonus.

Trip

I've just got back from a trip to Brantwood on Lake Coniston by public transport - it took 3 hours to get there and almost that long to get back too. I collected these dandelion leaves from St Andrews Church in Coniston village at lunchtime (i didn't get time to collect any from Brantwood itself, but have some from there on an earlier trip). I've now put them in a heavy book to press before I put one in the dandelion diary.

Today i also saw 4 Little Egrets, 3 black rabbits and 1 nun - you don't see that if you're driving.

Luck

I'm a very lucky person: I have loads of great friends and I know lots of really interesting people that i've gathered throughout my life (i'm 32). One of my most favourite people on the whole planet is called Owen. He used to come and do plant surveys on a remote farm where I lived in the back of beyond years ago. He's a botanist.

Unfortunately for him it means that he gets masses of emails from me pestering for information, comments, plant ID (usually from slightly blurred photos) etc...
I'm not sure he always gets what i'm doing - there is no scientific value to the dandelion project, therefore why would you waste your time?

He sent me this email about the dandelion project:

The problem is that your collection has focussed on the variety and fantastic architectural diversity of dandelion leaves. The leaves are helpful in taxonomy but not reliable and the only way to be fairly sure which dandelion you have is to gather flowers in April.
I think most of your plants come from verges - which probably means that they are all part of the section Ruderalia, and many will probably be (accidental) introductions to the UK.

All is not lost, however. I'm copying this to my friend K W*, who used to work with us at Monks Wood but is now a key person in the BSBI. He's done some work on dandelions himself and may be able to suggest better than I can how best to progress with getting to grips with dandelions - and indeed whether you can use your leaf collection at all.

Take care
Much love
Owen XXX

Hmmm - what is the point of my leaf collection? Owen thinks there might not be a use for it at all, but surely that's only in a botanical sense.


* I wanted to protect the identity of the innocent, hence using initials and not their full name.

Japanese link

So, I was having a conversation with someone about the dandelion project and they mentioned an article they'd read in The Times that reported that the European dandelion was now considered an alien invasive species in Japan.

With further research I found that it has spread to many parts of Japan, particularly in urban and sub-urban areas, as it sucessfully out-competes the native Japanese species. Because the European dandelion is apomictic (it dosen't need pollinating before it sets seed), negative effects are incurred by native dandelions that do need to be pollinated before producing seeds.

I've read a few journals from various institutes in Japan that have conducted studies: The School of Human Science, Waseda University, Japan; National Institute for Agro-Environmental Sciences, Ibaraki, Japan; and the Laboratory of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture, Kinki University, Nara, Japan.

I wonder if they do T-shirts from Kinki Uni? I want one if they do.

Variety

After a little general research into dandelions I have become more and more interested.
The Kew website says:

"As most British dandelions produce fruit without being fertilised (they are apomictic), substantial problems arise with the taxonomy of these plants. This group is complex consisting of around 200 microspecies, and is typically treated as a species aggregate, denoted as Taraxacum officinale agg. The dandelion is a perennial plant, and flowers throughout the year. Dandelions have deep taproots, and the whole plant contains a milky fluid known as latex. The flowerheads close at night, and can produce around 2,000 wind-dispersed fruits. Plants can also regenerate from pieces of the taproot."

There is also a really great book Dandelions of Great Britain and Ireland by AA Dudman and AJ Richards which gives loads of information:

"the number of native Taraxacum species known in Britain and Ireland probably doesn't exceed 150. Because of the ease of spread of wind-blown seeds, the proximity to Continental Eurpoe and the rediness of dandelions to prosper in man-made environments, there is a steady import of continental species, mostly in the Section Ruderalia, and this accounts for the larger number of some 235 species recorded from the British Isles".

I'm not especially interested in identifying all the different species I find - i'm not sure if i'd be any good at this really difficult subject, plus that's not really why i'm doing the dandelion project in the first place.

The image above is of a specimen sheet I produced for John Fox and Sue Gill at the Beach House in Baycliff. It shows some of the different dandelion leaves I collected around the site while there in May 2009.

Rare glimpse inside the dandelion diary

In keeping with most diaries, I don't like to show them to anyone: I'm often not where I said I would be! This is a page view from 2008 - no secrets revealed here.

Diary

I have a particular type of diary that I like to present my collected dandelions in.
For 2008 and 2009 Thomas Saible painted the covers for me. It makes them very beautiful on the outside. However, they are a bit messy on the inside and my hand writing is (and always has been) rubbish.

I'll collect a dandelion leaf from anywhere I visit - well anywhere I remember to collect one.

I don't like to travel with the dandelion diary as it's too precious. Because of this I often tuck leaves away in my sketchbook, but forget they are there until weeks later; or in my wallet between credit cards... hmmm - you'd think i'd worked out a good method by now.
I actually collect 2 leaves from each plant - one for the diary and the other for the dandelion archive (which, at this point, is still a figment of my imagination).

Labelling

"A specimen without a label is useless"

"It is impermissible to press a plant, let alone to send it to anyone else, without a proper label, preferably in permanent ink, dark pencil or typed, giving as an absolute minimum the habitat, locality, grid reference, vice-county, date, collector's name, flower colour and habit"
Arthur O. Chater, Collecting and Pressing Specimens.

A specimen without a label is only useless to a botanist. But i'm not a botanist, i'm an artist. So i've made my own labels and use my own system of catergorising.

(The label here shows an image of Hemlock Conium maculatum on it - i do have a label with dandelion leaves, but i can't be bothered to look for it on my computer - sorry)

Dandelion Project

This is the beginning of my blog about the Dandelion Project, but the project has been running for a couple of years or more already (mainly in my head).

I think it started in early 2006 when I decided to conduct a weed survey in Preston city centre (for an art exhibition). I found over 70 different plant species in a small urban area - in cracks in the pavement, down gutters, on roof tops etc. I was interested in how species adapt to the harsh environment of the urban landscape, but also found that some species thrive in it too.
Dandelions were one of the top in numbers, and I noticed that many had different shaped leaves and were very variable. Perhaps this is where the Dandelion Project started?

The following year I was lucky enough to be invited to make new artwork for an exhibition at Bolton Museum and Art Gallery where I met with Patricia Francis - Keeper of Botany at the Museum. She showed me how to collect, press and present specimens. It was then that I started to collect dandelion leaves and press them. At first there was no order to the collection and I didn't really label them at all, but at the start of 2008 I started to devise my own methods of labelling and proceeded to use a diary to document where and when they had been collected.