Student helps budding botanists see through ‘green blur’

November 2, 2016

Photo by Steffi Ickert-Bond. UA Museum of the North graduate student Shawnee Gowan talks about mushroom identification at a walk on the UAF campus organized by the herbarium in August 2016.

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Learning to identify plants takes some time. An observer must slow down and look for distinguishing features, and determine whether the specimen is an annual or a perennial and if it’s woody or not. Is it a conifer or a flowering plant? Does it have compound leaves or simple leaves?

For University of Alaska Fairbanks graduate student Shawnee Gowan, this process requires a shift in perspective. “My undergraduate ecology professor described it as seeing through the green blur,” she said.

Gowan worked with others during the summer to train community members in the basics of plant identification through workshops sponsored by the University of Alaska Museum of the North.

It’s like a game of Pokémon Go — once people get an eye for the different types of plants that live in their ecosystem, they may begin to appreciate them and more easily classify how they relate to other organisms.

Besides, Gowan said, it can’t just be left up to botanists to document all the plants in Alaska. There are far too many, and the environment is changing so quickly.

“High-latitude ecosystems are facing a rapidly changing climate, which will likely cause a loss of biodiversity,” she said. “With the help of other exploring eyes, we can capture far more of this state’s biodiversity before it is gone.”

Although Alaska is relatively species-poor at a per-site level, its vast size, special geologic history and relatively low level of historical plant exploration means that it contains perhaps the highest proportion of undiscovered species of flora in the United States, according to UAMN herbarium Curator Steffi Ickert-Bond.

“With the decrease in federal funding for this kind of research, we think the only way we can document biodiversity is by involving the general public to submit their photographs and make observations,” she said.

Gowan began working at the museum’s herbarium in the spring of 2016 after spending a field season with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in various refuges. “I didn’t want to leave Alaska and was determined to find a way to stay and study Arctic vegetation,” she said. “Lichens in particular.”

Photo by Shawnee Gowan. The lichen species Placopsis gelata is found in the foreland of the Baird Glacier in Southeast Alaska. The foreland is the region between the leading edge of the glacier and the moraines of the latest maximum.

It’s easy to understand Gowan’s fascination with this particular organism. Lichens are plants, so it makes sense that a botanist would want to study them. But they are also a fungus.

More specifically, they are both an algae and a fungus, an organism that indulges in a perfect symbiotic relationship.

“I am interested in fungi because of the critical roles they play in their respective ecosystems, while remaining relatively discrete in physical presence,” Gowan said. “Specifically, I am fascinated by the nature of the various forms of symbioses that fungi take part in.”

These range from parasitic relationships, in which the fungi takes what it needs from the plant, to mycorrhizal associations, in which the fungi colonizes the root system of a host plant, providing increased water and nutrient absorption so the plant can in turn provide a fungus with food formed from photosynthesis.

The plants are also beautiful to behold. They have an endless repeating pattern that stretches across almost anything in their path, as long as that landscape stays still enough to endure the long, slow lifespan.

Gowan said fungi are responsible for the majority of decomposition on the planet. “Without fungi, we would be wading through piles of dead plants, animals and organic waste.”

In fact, they serve many roles in every ecosystem — from decomposition to parasites and pathogens to symbionts. Fungi are microscopic and macroscopic, they are everywhere and yet they are often invisible under our feet.

They are also a reliable food source.

At an identification walk at the beginning of the fall semester, the museum invited the community to learn how to identify wild mushrooms. That can be a daunting task, but Gowan said knowledge will get people past the fear.

Photo by Karen Dillman. Shawnee Gowan inspects a population of Placopsis, lichen known to be found only at this site in the foreland of the Baird Glacier near Petersburg, Alaska.

“My advice would be, if you are interested in fungi, learn about them in small steps," she said. "There are many great books and enthusiastic ‘fungiphiles’ to teach you bits here and there. If you want to learn which are edible, choose one or two to become very comfortable with and then work on expanding your menu.”

In fact, most fungi are not deadly poisonous, though many do have lookalikes that can make you ill. “Mushroom hunting is a hobby that must be treated with care and respect; however, there are many other reasons to learn about our native fungi outside of searching for food.”

In the future, the museum’s herbarium team plans more collaborative events to engage citizen scientists and capitalize on the enthusiasm of local volunteers. Imagine a cadre of trained parabotanists to help fill in gaps about plant distribution and generate data for research on a variety of topics. This is possible because each person brings their own expertise and unique perspective.

“I was actually surprised by how much knowledge the participants had to offer at each event,” Gowan said. “I learned many interesting things about Alaska’s flora from people attending the workshops over the summer, like how firefighters use lichens to determine how dry a forest is and how to use plants to dye and print on silk.”