Rosemary Purdie ‘Wildflowers and vegetation of Kamchatka, Far East Russia’

Rosemary Purdie is a plant ecologist who cut her botanical teeth doing vegetation mapping in western Queensland in the 1970s, has never been able to walk past plants since without checking them out, and has done extensive plant collecting in all Australian states and territories. A decade ago she exchanged a career with the Commonwealth Government for voluntary work in, for example, the Australian National Herbarium, plus regular trips to Central Asia where she continues to be enthralled by the cultures, landscapes and vegetation.

Rosemary recently visited Kamchatka, known as Russia’s land of ice and fire: ice because of its long, extreme winters, and fire because of the many volcanoes. These elements contribute to a varied and beautiful floral display over spring and summer. Rosemary will introduce lowland forest, tundra, lava flow and alpine vegetation and plants she saw, and show a colourful relationship between some local plants and brown bears!