Water Lily folio 2v stalk remedy

[-JKP-]

Sam, I have a herbarium collection (a small one) that I've been working on for quite a few years.

There are things you notice about plants when you flatten and dry them. Here are a few observations:

• The relationship of the leaves to the stem is easier to see when they are flattened and dried (and makes it easier to draw).
  
• The leaves are all flattened in the same dimension, so leaves appear broader because they are not being seen from the side.
  
• Depending on the flexibility or lack of flexibility of the petiole (the stem that attaches the leaf), sometimes you see the backs of all the leaves or the fronts of all of the leaves because bending them to show both sides (which is preferable), would break the specimen.
  
• Sometimes you have to bend back the flower (so it's upside-down) in order not to break the stem when you flatten it (look at the flowers on the VMS viola—they are upside-down—it's possible it was drawn from a specimen).
  
• Petals are fragile and sometimes change color or shrivel up to nothing, or fall off, after they are dried. Leaves and stems will often retain their color (at least for a few years) but petals can change dramatically even within a few days. For example, a purple flower sometimes changes to pale yellow when it's dried.
  
• Leaves sometimes take on a different shape when they are dried because the veins provide a structure that may hold them more rigidly in one direction than another. For example, there is an African plant that has a normal elliptical leaf when it's alive but when you dry it, it dries more in one direction than the other, and the leaves end up looking like birds' heads with little beaks. There are probably many other plants with similar characteristics.
  
• Leaves that are spread out horizontally when the plant is alive, sometimes look like semi-vertical clumps when they are dried.