Plants of Equestria · 2:17pm Jun 26th, 2022
This week, after messing around using the PlantNet app to identify, or misidentify, the weeds in my garden, I decided to see what it could tell us about the plant life of Equestria. The way it works is you feed it a photo, and it applies the magic of machine learning to reference it against a database of images and identify the best fit. A very useful tool for botany students and gardeners. The accuracy has improved a lot in recent years, thanks to photographs provided by citizen scientists.
Let’s start with the new depictions of Equestrian flora in Make Your Mark:
Posey’s elegant red flowers seem to be some sort of rose. Rosa chinensis or rosa luciae maybe. Possibly rosa gallica. This seems to be an unusual cultivar with single flowers on straight vertical stems growing straight up from the ground and no visible thorns. The roots are also able to break through paving stones. That’s got to be a lot of paperwork for the sheriff’s office.
The best guess for the blue flowers in Posey’s garden are vinca major (greater periwinkle), or maybe platycodon grandifloras. Or something else. The similar purple blooms outside the lighthouse could be thunbergia erecta, or calibrachoa parviflora, or maybe ipomoea purpurea.
Identification can be more difficult with garden plants as gardeners do like their rare hybrids and cultivars. Let’s look at some of the plant life growing in the wild.
This splendid specimen can be identified as a cercis siliquastrum, known as a Judas tree, as according to a reported myth, Judas Iscariot hanged himself from one. That doesn’t sound entirely appropriate for a Tree of Harmony, so maybe it is a ceiba speciose, tabebuia rosea, handroanthus impetiginosus, or one of the many other trees that bear pink blossom. Although it seems that in Equestria tree foliage, like ponies, can come in any colour.
Let’s now look at Bridlewood, which has an abundance of amazing plant life, so much that it’s difficult to get a clear shot of any one species to allow identification.
However, the climbing vine on the right of this picture is recognisable - hedera helix (common ivy) is a familiar sight covering trees in much of the world. It provides nesting sites for birds and an important source of nectar for bees in winter months. And it is an invasive non-native species in North America and elsewhere. It is invading my garden over my neighbour’s fence from the north, south and east (the western front being held by hedera hibernica). Knowing how vigorous it can be, I have to admire the unicorns who, without magic, kept their vines neatly pruned. Indeed, all Bridlewood appears very well maintained, like a Japanese temple garden.
The plant life of G5 Equestria is tame compared to the G4 flora of the Everfree forest and elsewhere. What does PlantNet make of the plants in the old pony world? Unfortunately, we don’t have such high-resolution images to feed it, but let’s have a go.
This one gives a different result every time I try it. Gloriosa superba? Lathyrus apache? Ginkgo biloba? Actually, we don’t know. This is new to science.
What about this opportunistic species invading the Equestria Girls universe through a carelessly-opened portal. The best fit is sterculia striata, a fast-growing pioneer species in its native range in South America. Well, that’s what PlantNet identifies it as. Less-effective apps say it’s a tulip.
PlantNet says this is Not A Plant. Others apps say it’s a tulip.
The unsurprising conclusion to draw this study is that most plant species in Equestria do not feature in the PlantNet calibration data. The plant models used in the new generation world have no more resemblance to real species than the bunnies, seagulls, and ponies; and using cartoon images as input is just silly. But as well as giving me a bit of fun, this exercise did make me think about the role of plants in the Equestrian ecosystem, which leads a lot of interesting questions.
Back in Twilight Sparkle’s day, ponies lived on the edge of the wild Everfree forest, which we saw grow even wilder when pony magic was in trouble. However, by the time of Sunny and her friends, the loss of pony magic did not appear to have led to the kind of triffid attack seen in The Beginning of the End. In fact, it seems to have left the plants of Equestria more docile than ever. The countryside around Maretime Bay has as much botanical interest as a golf course, and Bridlewood doesn’t have anything more dangerous than a few tree roots to trip up ponies.
Now earth ponies have acquired their magic flower power, does this mean they are now destined to live happily ever after tending their gardens (ignoring the possible interference of a mysterious alicorn). Or will the return of magic have further biological consequences? Just as dragon eggs are now randomly washing up on beaches, will we see long-dormant plunder seeds awaking? Could the Bridlewood ever turn into something more sinister?
And what did happen to the Everfree forest?
I've heard of PlantNet before. This is a genius idea and super hilarious.
I mean, depending on your particular interpretations of Christianity and of Harmony.....
Not sure Judas Trees can get that big. From the thickness of the trunk(s), ceiba speciosa seems most likely of the suggested species.
This is as hilariously studious as Admiral Biscuit's pony weight experiment. I approve! Keep up the good science!
What kind of plant is a plunder vine anyway?
Or, for that matter, Discord?
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Good point, I have to admit I am not best qualified to discuss he theological interpretations of MLP.
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Nor am I, not that I didn't try with mixed results 🙃
5667829
Either a venus fly trap, or a lettuce.
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That was good science! And like a proper Good ScientistTM I outsourced the math part of it.
you always have such fabulous blogs
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Wait, PlantNet thinks Discord might be human?
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It does make a shocking amount of sense...
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I know that and you know that, but how does an AI who was only shown a single picture know that?
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It doesn't. The result was inconclusive, but then the Lord of Chaos tampered with the network weights until it gave a reading.
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Reminds me of this blog stating how Calvinism is the closest brand of Christianity to MLP, due to cutie marks and destiny/predestination stuff. Not sure how a Judas tree would fit in there though.
I'm also not particularly qualified when it comes to theology either.
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Fascinating blog. I'm not sure my interpretation of cutie marks is quite so narrow... but I do admit the parallels.