I’m preparing for another trip down to Montgomery Botanical Center in Miami in the hopes of catching the Caribbean Zamia in pollination.  At this stage in my phd, I feel like I have a million ideas and it’s hard to realize that I can’t do all of them.  So hard, in fact that I often can’t let some ideas go!  No matter what idea I end up following through to the end though, I know one thing; I have to catch the plants when they are coning.  Each species will only be in cone once a year and even if I don’t know exactly what direction I am taking, I can’t waste a whole year.  So, I’ll be heading down in two weeks to collect volatiles and tissue for RNA from all of the Caribbean species that I find in cone.  The native Florida species, Zamia integrifolia should be in cone and I’m hoping to see their weevil pollinators, Rhopalotria slossoni.  I’m super excited to go back to Montgomery Botanical Center.  It’s a cycad (or palm, if you’re into that kind of stuff) scientist’s dream.  Here’s a couple of pictures from my last trip down when I was working with Zamia furfuracea.