Friday, November 11, 2016

UW Botany Professor's work on restoring sweet apple to air on Wyoming PBS on Nov 14, 2016 at 9:00am

The sweet apple was a critical resource during settlement of the central Rocky Mountain States. Highly adaptable, the apple was a convenient food source of great nutritional value, even when dried, and provided numerous other critical products for the pioneers and homesteaders. The diversity of apple cultivars in Wyoming during these years was quite high. A number of apple varieties were even developed specifically for the cold drought-prone, high elevation climate of Wyoming.

Alarmingly, the last remnants of 19th and early 20th century plantings struggle to survive in isolated nearly forgotten or abandoned orchards. These apples have survived in many cases for over a century unattended under harsh conditions and are still producing fruit. That makes each of these trees and cultivars extremely valuable. Unfortunately, the identification of individual trees in orchards to specific cultivars has been mostly lost.

Dr. Miller is holding the newly grafted
tree from the 130+ year old one
that is producing sweet apples
Dr. Steve Miller (Professor, Botany) has been on a quest to find and save these 100+ year old apple trees in Wyoming by grafting them onto new rootstock.  These vigorously growing trees will be planted into a germplasm repository orchard at the Sheridan Research and Extension Center (ShREC) and used to restore historic orchards such as the one at the Central Wyoming College Field Station in Lander.

His team is using molecular techniques to identify trees to specific cultivars. There is currently great interest in restoring old trees to productivity, and establishing new orchards in Wyoming for sweet apple fruit production for sale at local farmers markets and for hard cider production. The Wyoming Apple Project is providing critical information on which cultivars are best to grow in various regions of Wyoming. This information will allow nurseries to sell cultivars that are best suited to specific regions.

Dr. Miller’s research on Wyoming apples is funded by the Wyoming Department of Agriculture Specialty Crops Program and the UW Agricultural Experiment Station.

Additional information about this work can be found in the article published by the Wyoming Livestock Roundup.

NOTE: 

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

Botany faculty Ken Driese, Chris North, and Ramesh Sivanpillai represented the Botany Department in the 2016 Campus Pass event.

Ken Driese and Chris North (right) interacting with potential students
Botany faculty members Ken Driese, Chris North, and Ramesh Sivanpillai described the Botany and Biology degree programs to prospective UW students and their parents during the 2016 Campus Pass event on September 17, 2016 in the UW Student Union.

Campus Pass gives students an opportunity to check out academic programs, talk to faculty and staff members, and learn about other UW services. High school and transfer students inquired about degree programs offered by our department, and we answered their questions on specializations within degree programs, minors, and career opportunities. Campus Pass is an important event for recruiting undergraduate students to Botany and Biology programs.

Monday, September 19, 2016

Botany faculty Ellen Currano’s research accomplishments highlighted by UW President in the State of the University Address

Dr. Currano at an early Eocene site near Dubois, Wyoming

Botany faculty Dr. Ellen Currano’s impressive research accomplishments were recognized by UW President Nichols in her State of the University Address on September 16, 2016.

President Nichols selected one faculty member from each of the eight colleges and described them while highlighting the importance of research and scholarship at UW.

It was a proud moment for the Botany Department and its faculty, staff and students when Ellen was selected to represent the College of Arts & Sciences and her grant funding and peer-reviewed publication records were mentioned in this annual important.

Friday, March 11, 2016

Botany faculy member Currano wins A&S extraordinary merit in Research award

Botany faculty member Dr. Ellen Currano has won the College of A & S extraordinary merit in research award for spring 2016. Dr. Currano studies how ancient forests responded to environmental disturbances. Better understanding of these past changes will help in predicting how present ecosystems could respond to environmental disturbances.



To learn more about her research and other accomplishments, please visit her website at:
http://www.uwyo.edu/geolgeophys/faculty/ellen-currano.html

Dr. Currano has previously won the Promoting intellectual engagement (PIE) award for inspiring students in first-year courses, and she is also the co-founder of the Bearded Lady Project: Challenging the face of science.
More information about this project can be found at: http://thebeardedladyproject.com/

Monday, March 7, 2016

Visit UW Williams Conservatory to see plants from different parts of the world

--- Contributed by Meredith Pratt

Tired of the Wyoming wind and cold? Come escape to the tropics in the Williams Conservatory! Plants native to South Africa, Madagascar, Brazil, India, etc. fill the rooms of the conservatory to provide you with an experience foreign to Laramie.


Throughout the year, you will see the beautiful plants like the Bird of Paradise (Strelitzia reginae) flowering in the Williams Conservatory. Native to South Africa, this exotic plant grows up to 6 feet fall with large green leaves resembling that of banana plants.




The flower, famous for favoring the crest of a bird, is comprised of three orange and three blue tepals, structures that contain both the sepal and petals. A pollinator in search of nectar, usually a bird, lands on one of the tepals forcing the anthers to emerge from the petals and disperse pollen onto the pollinator’s feet. This pollen is transported to another flower aiding in the reproduction of this beautiful plant. With the design of the flower trapping the pollen, the bird of paradise is given an OPALS (Ogren Plant Allergy Scale) rating of 1, “very low potential to cause allergies.”

Visit Williams Conservatory's Instagram page for other amazing pictures:
https://www.instagram.com/uw_williams_conservatory/

Visit Williams Conservatory's webpage for additional details:

Monday, January 25, 2016

Plant Sale - 2016

Saturday Jan 30, 2016
Sale will run from 10 AM - 3 PM or until the plants are gone.
Williams Conservatory, UW


For additional information, contact:

Meredith Pratt
Coordinator, Greenhouse Operations
Williams Conservatory, 
Department of Botany
University of Wyoming
mpratt2@uwyo.edu
307-766-6487