I was out in the countryside trying to find interesting flowers to photograph when I came across this beautiful bumble bee collecting pollen from a thistle, Scotland's emblem. There have been no ...

The botanical name for the national floral emblem of Scotland, the thistle, is Onopordum acanthium, and as we all know, thistle plants have sharp prickles. The sharp protrusions can be anywhere on ...

It is called a thistle cup because its shape is designed to look like the head of a thistle flower. The base is rounded and the rim turns outwards at the edge, which copies the shape of the flower.

Every August this thistle is one of the only plants to flower in most of Spain’s arid Mediterranean habitats, giving it a virtual monopoly on the local bees and other pollinators.