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Q. Who is Mr. Smarty Plants?

A: There are those who suspect Wildflower Center volunteers are the culpable and capable culprits. Yet, others think staff members play some, albeit small, role. You can torture us with your plant questions, but we will never reveal the Green Guru's secret identity.

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Ask Mr. Smarty Plants is a free service provided by the staff and volunteers at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center.

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Please forgive us, but Mr. Smarty Plants has been overwhelmed by a flood of mail and must take a break for awhile to catch up. We hope to be accepting new questions again soon. Thank you!

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Tuesday - June 05, 2012

From: Amarillo, TX
Region: Southwest
Topic: Plant Identification
Title: Is there an App for that?
Answered by: Damon Waitt

QUESTION:

Do you have an app like leafsnap that my students can use to identify the plants around our school? I would like them to take a picture of the leaf of each plant with their iPads and have your data base pull up a picture and name of the plant. Is that possible? If not, can you direct me to an app that can accomplish this goal? Many thanks,

ANSWER:

No we do not...but we wish we did. Mr. Smarty Plants has tried using the LeafSnap application in the Central Texas area with some success on species that are common to both central Texas and the northeastern US where the LeafSnap App was developed. According to their website, Leafsnap currently includes the trees of New York City and Washington, D.C., and will soon grow to cover the trees of the entire continental United States. Let's hope Texas is high on their priority list.

 

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