M.Sc. (Botany) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

This thesis includes the work of Vicki L. Clarke for a Masters in Fine Arts.

The coloring matter in flowers has been used for centuries as a dye. Early man did not know the chemical nature of these coloring matters. Recent investigations have shown that the dark pigments whereas the lighter pigments of flowers are in the anthoxanthin group of pigments. Both of these groups of pigments have a heterocyclic structure. A large number of these pigments have been isolated and identified. The object of this research was to isolate and identity the coloring matter in the Camillia japonica (Belgian red) flowers. This was done by extracting the pigment with methanol and then crystallizing the pigment as a chloride. Color reactions, solubility, spectra, and other physical properties were obtained for this pigment.

The purpose of this thesis has been to make a collection of the seeds of herbaceous dicotyledonous garden flowers of Utah, to examine their external structural characteristics and to prepare keys for their classification. A collection of the seeds of 146 species of garden flowers has been made, and includes species of 41 families. The seeds have been cleaned and dried and a collection stored in labelled vials and left in the Botany Department of the Brigham Young University. Keys have been prepared for the identification of the families, genera, and species. As far as possible external characteristics--such as color, size, and texture--which can be seen without the use of magnification, have been used. For seeds which are too small or which have characteristics too similar to be distinguished with the naked eye, a millimeter scale and a binocular microscope have been used. The term "seed" has been used to designate any propagules. Descriptions of the families and species have been included with the keys. Drawings have been made of the seeds of each species reported. In preparing the drawings a "Camara Lucida" was attached to a binocular microscope and the outlines of the seeds carefully followed. Details of structure and texture were drawn by hand with the aid of a binocular microscope. The seeds were drawn to scale and the measurements included with the drawings. The photographed copies of the drawings were reduced to one-half the size of the originals. Although there has been no attempt to make this work all-inclusive, most of the herbaceous dicotyledonous garden flowers found in Utah have been reported. It is hoped that the study will be of value to those interested in seed identification and that it may serve as a step toward further work in this field.

No description available.

The effects of planting date were evaluated on field establishment and flowering of ten southwestern wildflower species combined in a mix. Species tested include Baileya multiradiata, Castilleja lanata, Eschscholtzia californica, Eschscholtzia mexicana, Gaillardia pulchellum, Lesquerella gordonii, Lupinus sparsiflorus, Orthocarpus purpurascens, Penstemon eatonii, and Phacelia campanularia. Seeds of all species were combined in a mix and directly seeded into field plots. All species are native to the southwestern deserts of the United States. Treatments consisted of five planting dates, starting September 30, 1987 and continuing through November 30, 1987, with treatments planted at two week intervals during the ten week period. There were significant differences in both plant stand and flowering between planting dates. The October 15 planting had the optimum plant stand with regard to the largest spectrum of species represented by desirable numbers. Flowering was most pronounced in the September 30 and October 15 plantings.

Eudora Welty's short story "Flowers for Marjorie" appears in A Curtain of Green and Other Stories, her first volume of collected stories published in 1941. Since the story's publication, literary scholars have interpreted the protagonist's murder of his wife, and the unusual events that follow, in terms of somatic realities that inform the text. This thesis is a psychoanalytic rereading/rewriting of "Flowers for Maijorie" that attempts to analyze its text as a possible dream narrative. By psychoanalytically rereading/rewriting the narrative in this story as a possible dream narrative, this thesis will attempt to demonstrate how the reader might experientially break through its previous resistance to interpretation, which should encourage a better understanding of the story's narrative ambiguities. The originality of this examination lies in its detailed analysis of the story's text from a psychoanalytic economy, thus providing perhaps the most detailed analysis of its text to date.

Margaret Fuller’s and Elizabeth Stoddard’s innovative use of the language of flowers in “The Magnolia of Lake Pontchartrain” and The Morgesons explore multilevel feminine discourse in ways later described by Hélène Cixous and Luce Irigary. Fuller uses flowers symbolically in her text, not mimicking conventional sentimental motifs, but inspiring women’s independence and self-development. Fuller’s flower images become anthropomorphic possibilities for female empowerment which re-envision American women’s social roles and express Fuller’s developing feminism. Stoddard’s use of flowers reflects her realist writing and captures many of the contemporary social applications of flowers. Stoddard, like Alice Walker, sees some artistic agency for women through gardening, but ultimately finds the comparison of women to flowers an antiquated system which holds women back in search of social progress.

The gynoecia of all three species considered in this study originate not as individual carpel primordia but rather as a continuous ring. Processes of continued radial expansion and differential zonal growth give rise to the mature body of the gynoecium with no observable fusion taking place. Later manifestations of distinctness and separation of carpels represent secondarily acquired traits. Consequently, the mature gynoecia of the Malvaceae cannot be reliably used to infer early developmental events. The physical environment in which carpels originate is proposed to play a role in determining carpel number. Carpel size at inception does not vary considerably among the different species surveyed here. Ring size, however, does and this presumably dictates carpel number by the upward limit of what its circumference can ultimately accommodate. The uniovulate condition appears to be derived from the pluriovulate one through several interrelated developmental events. On the basis of acropetal initiation of ovules in Abutilon species and the precocious development of style primordia in Malacothamnus fasciculatus, a mechanism for the origin of the uniovulate carpel is proposed. Here, early style growth may limit zonal growth of the gynoecial base so that the acropetal series of ovule initiations is disrupted, leaving only a single basal one. The study of gynoecial development in this group has been hindered by certain problems of interpretation (e.g., Duchartre, 1845; Klotz, 1975; present account). These include difficulties in conceptualization of developmental processes and their reconciliation with preconceived views of the evolutionary origin of gynoecia. Consideration of relative size among successive stages is crucial, since the affect of radial growth is otherwise easily overlooked. Despite the differences of their mature gynoecia, the three species studied were determined to be strikingly similar in development, thereby supporting the close affinities attributed to them. In the final analysis, however, conclusive statements regarding the systematic implications of the ontogenetic patterns observed would be premature. Too few taxa have been studied and those that have should be reassessed in light of the developmental phenomena presented here. / M.S.

Typescript (photocopy). / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries