My little sister spends WAAYYY to much time on that website, Scylla!

But I suppose you can have animals. It is supposed to be a nature-related scene, mythical and such!

Can someone else plleeaassee judge Sketch? 

This is my entry for Drawing. It also comes with a (pretty long) account of the plant. Sorry, I sort of turned this into a writing project rather than an art project, but I couldn't resist. It was originally going to be a 'short account on Jasperweed', but I got into the zone and couldn't stop typing...

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The twisting, threatening, seemingly harmless vine you see innocently winding its way through the below-presented forest has been donned by botanists Planta Anguis, or the snake plant. Also known as jasperweed, or, more uncommonly, bee ivy, this angiosperm weaves its way through the forest floor with the ominous appeal of a snake. Jasperweed is a scientific phenomenon; practically something from a fairy tale; with an otherworldly aura hanging heavily around it, and the promise of death dripping silently from each and every one of its innocuous flowers. 

Many young plant sprouts and tree saplings will find themselves dead after a few days of being clenched within the tight clutches of the vine's tendrils, but larger trees and bushes have a more unfortunate fate when the ever-growing jasperweed snakes nearer. They are, inevitably, to be covered top to bottom with the bright green Planta Anguis and its vivid orange flowers. Jasperweed can, as studies show, grow up to four inches in a day; however, in highly acidic soils, certain specimens have been known to increase their size in a day by up to six inches. 

Jasperweed isn't sometimes called bee ivy for the mere charming aspect of a simple title. The alluring orange and scarlet flowers of this vine hold sweet nectar, yes, but when farmers unwittingly allow their bees to collect this nectar they are also allowing their honey to be tainted with poison. The flowers of jasperweed plants contain a unique poison in their nectar known as acidocardium, which is surprisingly found only in a jasperweed plant. When bees, ants, wasps, moths, hummingbirds, or any other living organisms drink the bee ivy's sticky, potent substance, they experience a slow, painful death just hours later. (It is thought that the delay in the poison's action allows an insect to pollinate other Planta Anguis plants before it dies.) But there is indeed more to this dicot's brilliant scheme.

The bees do not know they have been poisoned until it's too late; and, as all social insects do, they bring back their quota of nectar without a second thought to what they have gathered. Due to the fact that bees will only visit one species of plant over the course of a whole day, half of a bee colony could be dead by sunset. If a bee keeper doesn't notice the corpses of his bees at the base of his hive before gathering its honey, he could potentially be collecting poisonous honey, more specifically known as iaspis honey. Iaspis honey can kill young children, elderly people, and individuals with compromised immune systems. It can cause high fevers, severe blisters, and rashes in older children and adults. The only remedy to iaspis honey is to ingest cinnamon before effects of the poison can continue for too long.

Jasperweed grows like kudzu and contains potentially deadly poison, but unfortunately, of all the hundreds of attempts to kill and reduce the jasperweed population, not many have actually succeeded. Jasperweed is extremely hardy and very nearly resistant to the famous weed killer, Roundup. If jasperweed is cut, the trimmings will take root wherever they are left, (assuming they are left in a suitable envirionment for growth), and once jasperweed has taken a hold on a tree or bush, it bores into the trunk with tiny tendrils and winds them deep into the wood. This makes it almost impossible to yank the vine from its position. If one decides to burn jasperweed, he should be careful, as the fumes from the smoke are not healthy to breath in. And, as jasperweed's nectar is poisonous and not venomous, even the touch of a flower can irritate the skin of a human's hand.

There is one efficient way to kill jasperweed, and it must be done when the plant is going to seed, which it does once a year over the course of spring. After a flower has been suitably pollinated, an incredibly fantastical phenomenon occurs. The pistil of the flower sends some of the pollen it has recieved to all of the other flowers on the specimen through a special tube that runs through the entire plant, ensuring that all flowers go to seed at the exact same time. As the petals fall off, the sepals, which stay on the flower even after it has bloomed, close up again over the base of the flower, where the seeds begin to develop! They then gradually turn purple and out of the entire vine begins to emerge thorns, sharp as swords and nearly three inches long. Then the jasperweed shrivels up, or so it seems to the average onlooker. It actually concentrates all of the nutrients and water contained inside it into the base of the plant, granting small amounts of sap to the seeds growing in the wide-spaced brittle purple shells. This makes it easy to clip the stems apart, dig up the base of the jasperweed, place them all in some sort of containment unit, and drive them to your nearest scientific lab. One must be extremely careful not to touch the brown parts of the vine, as they are coated with pure, undiluted acidocardium. One must also be careful not to let the seed pods explode when shaken, which they do with much force in order to distribute their seeds far away.

Planta Anguis is indeed a formidable enemy in the forest, and many believe it is more animal than plant. Thankfully, jasperweed is rare and unheard of in most places. Most people live their entire life without encountering iaspis honey or its cause. Scientists are still furthur exploring this strange, otherworldly plant and its lifestyle, and will hopefully soon discover a way to better control this leafy monster. 

Katydid, can you do second and third place also? I'm pretty sure Micearenice will win, so I'm going for second now.

Very sorry for not posting this earlier! It totally slipped my mind. 

Rules for Origami:

-Due on the 12th of April! This may seem soon, but it's because I'm going to my cousin's bar mitzvah and by the time I get back, it might seem to be too late. 

-Ideally would be an 8x10" sheet of paper size folded, but with a good explanation could be larger. 

-The theme will be "Spring". Any animal, color, or fashion of that style. 

Good luck!