Concept, photography, graphics and plate design
Richard Milne began collecting and identifying plants aged about 7, and was probably always destined to study plant science. He did his undergraduate at Bristol, followed by 5 months on a biological expedition in South America, before starting a PhD on the molecular systematics of invasive British Rhododendron ponticum populations. This was followed by a series of attempts to obtain research funding for self-designed research projects, eventually leading to research papers on Rhododendron biogeography and the description of a new type of hybrid zone. Dr Milne came to Edinburgh University on a research fellowship, but soon became established as a lecturer, and has won four awards for his teaching, all voted for by students. These days, most of his research output is collaborative with several research groups in China, still mostly about biogeography and hybridisation.
After running in person classes on Plant ID for over a decade, Richard was suddenly faced with the need to create a resource that could be accessed remotely, due to the pandemic. The result was a website that worked rather well for Edinburgh students, but could not be used by anyone else because of copyright issues. His solution was to photograph the entire UK flora, a process that is not quite complete but far enough along to produce the resource you can see here.
Richard has written two novels, three books of cartoons, and the factual book “Rhododendron”. He lives in Edinburgh with his wife and son.
R.Milne@ed.ac.uk
Website Design
Ayaan Decosta was interested in web development and plants for a long time. After meeting Dr. Milne after one of his lectures at the Botanical Society of Scotland about his new plant ID project, they ssaw an opportunity to use their skills in the area to help, and volunteered to do so, building this website.
A.Decosta@ed.ac.uk
Dr Milne has had a lot of little snippets of help along the way, and will try to remember as many of these as possible here.
BSBI (Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland) for access to their database, making it possible to track down rare plants with the sort of speed necessary to complete this project in 4 years.
Nenya and Lawrence Milne for love support, tolerance of long working hours for their husband/father, and lots of help with navigating, planning trips and occasionally spotting rare plants before me.
Jane and Andrew Milne for accommodation, love and the Plymouth Pear photo.
Nelli and Georgi Viktorov for accommodation, love, and lots of food.
David Barrass – web design on the original iteration of this resource, within Edinburgh University.
Andy Shaw at the Rare Plants Nursery, Wales (https://www.rarebritishplants.com/) – for letting me photograph many of Britain’s very rarest plants, from his amazing operation growing about 70 of them from wild-sourced material. This project might have taken another whole year without him!
Botanic Gardens at Edinburgh, Kew, Cambridge, Uppsala and Tallinn, where many rare species were photographed.
Heid Jerstadt, for the use of her family’s cabin in Norway, which helped me add 40 difficult (in Britain) alpine species.
Friends I stayed with during the project: Harvey Lloyd-Thomas, Alistair Easterfield, the Waller Family, Rhona MacLean and family, Dave Fawcett, Douglas and Anne.
For tips, advice and help seeing individual species: Richard Lansdown, James Symonds, Reimo Rivis, Axel Poulsen, Charlotte Sletten Bjorå.
Judy Browett, for giving me a lift back to Swansea and saving me a 20 mile walk in the dark, after I unwisely went botanising on the Gower Peninsular on a day when no buses were running.
