Comments on: Identify this rattling plant.

Question: Identify this rattling plant.

Brian James — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 23:29:50 -0800

Identify this strange plant found in the middle east.

See photo here.

The curly things are rigid and hollow, so the plant would make a weird rustling sound when the wind struck it. It was found by the side of the road and is probably a weed-type plant of some kind. Can anyone provide a genus/species?

Better yet, is there a good field guide to plants on the web?

By: softlord

softlord — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 01:24:15 -0800

You should try Flickr's ID Please group, they're amazing at this kind of thing.

By: Solomon

Solomon — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 02:45:58 -0800

It looks a lot like a variety of eryngium to me.

By: oneirodynia

oneirodynia — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 10:22:11 -0800

It's really hard to tell what's what in that picture. Are the thistle/eryngium like leaves part of this plant, or another growing beside it? (FWIW, I've never seen an Eryngium make a seed head like this.)There's also no indication of scale. It would also help to know where in the Middle East. It wouldn't surprise me if someone came along who was familiar with this plant and was able to identify it, but there's no way to guess without knowing what's what in the photo.

You can try searching for field guides by region.