Talk:Rosette (botany)

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 12 August 2020 and 25 November 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Mam2726.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 08:23, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Attack of the Refdeskers

As I understand it, a rosette results from very short internodes, only at the crown. A rosette is not a whorl, which is what you call this kind of thing when it is not at the crown. The word "rosette" is used to describe a certain formation of leaves. Blechnum fluviatile doesn't belong here because, as its article says, it "develops a short trunk", and a rosette is at the crown. Also its article says "rosette shape", not "rosette". I will stand still and allow myself to be slapped really hard once for thinking all this stuff about rosettes, but only by an accredited botanist. (We're trying to get the facts straight for the article, whose language was unintelligible when we found it.) --Milkbreath (talk) 12:06, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi milkbreath – a machete is essential for google: From dictionary [[1] I'm getting that rosette is not a definitive structural term since it varies, it has a range: definition #4. Botany - A circular cluster of leaves that radiate from a center at or close to the ground, as in the dandelion.

Another dictionary: "• Biology a marking or group of markings resembling a rose. • a roselike cluster of parts, esp. a radiating arrangement of horizontally spreading leaves at the base of a low-growing plant."

For extra plants there are thistles[2] "Rosettes reestablish nearly any time during the growing season. Some rosettes may be three or four feet in diameter by late fall." Flower stalks grow from these as per others.

The thing about rosettes is that some plants keep to ground level (dandelion) and others like lettuce, continue to stem away from it due to the internodes lengthening in peak maturing/seeding season. Lettuces are cut at ground level before they start bolting but that doesn't preclude them from being rosettes. Hack away, Julia Rossi (talk) 13:05, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

One more before I have to go: http://aob.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/56/5/673 mentions the post-rosette stage of lettuce. I feel the fern should stay because it fits – not only is it in a rosette arrangement, making it a rosette within the scope of rosette (bot.) but it develops a colony of plantlets at its base as well. Will check in later if you like, but not fussed unless called on. Cheers, Julia Julia Rossi (talk) 13:18, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

PS what do you mean by "only at the crown" – the growing point? I don't understand because the rosette can be at the base with different leaves higher up in some plant families. It varies across families. JR

Jul, baby. I figured out why I care; my back yard has several varieties of rosetted plants instead of grass in it. One point at a time:

• I looked at many dictionaries first thing. That forced upon me the conclusions that "rosette" has a very specific meaning in botany and that I had no business editing this or any article about whatever you even call words like this one. The general dictionary definitions have no bearing on this article; there is a "rosette" in architecture and in cake decorating.
• Thistles, yes. That's one of the plants in my yard. (I mow, so they never get a chance to do their thing, but I see them all the time along the roadways here. Our state bird, the Eastern Goldfinch is wild about them.) They lie even flatter to the ground than a dandelion. I'm not sure what that website means about reestablishing; I guess the rosette shrivels when the plant bolts and regrows after.
• I've seen lettuce and cabbage do their thing. Ornamental cabbage is pretty popular around here, and it will run some if you let it. I contend that once the internode lengthens, there is no rosette. The head, the rosette, is at the crown.
• I still don't like the fern. Most ferns don't even have a stem, so how can they have a modified one? I don't know what you think the plantlets might have to do with it. This is where my knowledge falters, though, and I wish there was an expert near.
• With that last in mind, I'm going to beg for help at WikiProject Plants.
• By "only at the crown" I mean that the circular arrangement of leaves designated "rosette" in botany must be attached to the stem right after it leaves the root. The rosette is indeed at the base, and whatever exists above initially or later has no bearing on the matter.
• Please continue to check in. I'm somewhat out of my element, and a goddess of anything would be some comfort to have around, be it horticulture or botany or even ale. --Milkbreath (talk) 14:12, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

attack of the RDSkers (the sequel)

Hi MB, I hope you are persevering so I'll go through this carefully:

• Dictionary: yes rosette is a description, specific to shape, function and stage of a plant's maturity. See Plant morphology.
  
• No business editing: it is any constructive editor's business looking to improve wikipedia (my view). If you want an authoritative ruling, well it would be a pity if every article had to wait for that. Wikipedia would drop dead overnight. Some articles have authorities who pwn the page so I wouldn't ask for that exactly.
• In architecture and cake decorating: you're right, because it is a specfic shape; in those fields it is an adornment; not so in botany as you know, where everything has a function even when it is pretty, but it is still a shape of a plant's growth habit. (See Habit (biology)

However, it is used to describe a plant from a fern, to a thistle, to succulents, to epiphytes,and wiat for it, palms. Are you thinking it's maybe a classification? It's primarily a growth habit as different from say, a "branching" or indeterminate habit.

• When you use crown, see Crown (botany). When I use rosette for these families above, it applies to a shape with variations ranging from the truest form if you like, on the tap root at ground level, sending up flower stems (dandelion). Variations include: a stem with other kinds of leaves preceding or around the flower head; a lengthening as the plant matures, where the internodes are further apart and branch or stem to bear flowers/seed heads.
• Stay open with the ferns – there's more. There are rosette ferns such as Bird's Nest/Crows Nest, Fiddlehead or Ostrich Fern, and rosette epiphytes (Aspeniaceae, Elaphoglossaceae and Vittariaceae) for example Bromeliads.
• As for the difference between a rosette plant propagating at the base, one with a base that stems and branches to seed, and one that doesn't as the dandelion, the description is not definitive. What it isn't, I guess, is when it's a tree with a rosette crown such as palms, or tree fern; problem with that is that the young state is what you'd call rosette. Since some succulents have that growth habit and are described as "rosette", perhaps the descriptor should be extended rather than chopped back. : )

With all these taxonomies with members showing rosette morphology, the article should be well-muscled, dontcha think?

I can see you're passionate about this and going with it (rather than shutting things out) will take you on quite a trip.

I'm putting all this here as a contribution to the content which is what I thought the original ref plea was for. If it was for a qualified botanist, my bad because I'm not that. Julia Rossi (talk) 23:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, you could play one on television with all that info. Will masticate and ruminate and sleep on it (EDT, you know). I expect to be going to the local library before long to cram botany for this. --Milkbreath (talk) 01:10, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Have fun. I hear the clink of tea cups. ; ) Julia Rossi (talk) 01:20, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for asking at WikiProject Plants. I don't know enough to give a definitive definition, but you seem to be on the right track (I mostly know the word in terms of Asteraceae such as goldenrod). I will mention one other data point, the caulescent rosette which is described at Marcescence of all places and shown in the photograph Image:Frailejones chiles.JPG at Espeletia. Kingdon (talk) 05:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

I've removed the mention of goldenrod from the article; it isn't really any different (or more rosette-like) than a wide variety of Asteraceae (and in fact, since this is just from my memory, I could be getting mixed up on which plants had the rosettes and which ones were the goldenrods). If there was some source other than my talk page comment, feel free to adjust accordingly. Kingdon (talk) 16:31, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Half rosette

This term came up in another article. What is a half-rosette? Or half rosette? EE--78.150.141.201 (talk) 13:05, 21 May 2019 (UTC)