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Image of the day – 163
What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image every few days.
This is a flower head of cow parsley or one of its relatives, a wild plant that grows extensively in Britain on untrimmed grass verges, along hedgerows, and in similar places. It’s a member of the carrot family, the Apiaceae ( until 2011, Umbelliferae), the word ‘umbellifer’ is related to ‘umbrella’ and you can probably see why!
The umbellifers are an interesting group of plants, including carrot, parsnip, celery, parsley, dill, fennel, coriander and many more. Cow parsley, like the others listed here, is safe to eat – but be very careful; hemlock looks much like cow parsley and is deadly poisonous. The infamous giant hogweed is another harmful umbellifer.
It was a hemlock extract that the Greek philosopher Socrates was required to drink following a guilty verdict in Athens.
See also:
- Apiaceae – Wikipedia
- Cow parsley – Wikipedia
- Socrates – Wikipedia
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