The tutor shares a find he’s 90 percent certain about.

My daily walk takes me by a lot that’s been cleared but remains vacant. Searching such an area, a botany student will often be rewarded, as in this case.

A plant I’ve been glimpsing from the car, but never had time to examine close up, lives in that lot. One morning, at home, I grabbed the field guide to identify it. The plant has flat, compact yellow flowers in clusters of around 8. The leaves are palmate, very finely divided. The plant stands about 20cm tall.

In the guide I found the picture that’s an exact match: the dune tansy. There’s a problem, though: the ecology seems wrong. The dune tansy is supposed to live on seaside dunes, whereas the vacant lot is about 2km from shore.

The vacant lot’s ecology I’d describe as a disturbed site. The guide suggests the common tansy, a different variety, as a match for such a place. However, the common tansy is meant to have dots on its leaves, which don’t seem present on my sample.

Tansy is meant to smell of camphor. To check, I tore off a small leaf to crumple between my fingers. I was rewarded with the strong aroma of cold medicine.

The plant is definitely tansy. From the guide’s description, even though the plant seems “far from shore”, I’m calling it the dune tansy.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend:)

Source:

Pojar, Jim and Andy MacKinnon. Plants of Coastal British Columbia. Vancouver:
  BC Ministry of Forests and Lone Pine Publishing, 1994.

Jack of Oracle Tutoring by Jack and Diane, Campbell River, BC.