Pubs and botanists

Image courtesy of M. Jennings

Usually when we talk about Pubs on these pages, we are referring to BSBI's Publications Committee, which admittedly does like to head to the nearest pub for refreshment after one of our committee meetings. 

But did you know that there are at least two pubs (as in places to get a drink) named after botanists?

Malcolm has been in touch from the excellent Robert Pocock Herbarium Project, who reported last year on the pub named after Pocock. Well now he has discovered one named after William Withering! Read Malcolm's report here.

He also offered a quick update on how Team Pocock are getting on with tracking down and cataloguing the last few Pocock herbarium sheets. Over to Malcolm:

Image courtesy of M. Jennings

"Our project rolls on. Just before the end of last year we discovered that the NHM had a list of plants collected by Pocock – made in the 1960s perhaps. But it had been forgotten and “lost” in a cupboard. There were lists of plants by other collectors too. 

"So the last few months has seen us go back to search mode for those plants listed that we did not find during our previous search. They were not particularly ones that we had overlooked but rather plants that had confusing taxonomic changes or were collected outside of Kent. 

"Anyway we found about 30 more and we should be collecting the image scans next week. So we will have lots of new web pages to construct over the next few weeks".

Keep us posted please Malcolm - and let us know if you spot any more pubs named after botanists!