How to take a Photograph of the Biggest Tree in the World
via the ever so good 22 words
Posts from the ‘Plants’ Category
Nov 30
The Carboniferous Period
When plants evolved to become woody it took 50 million years for funghi to evolve a way to decompose them. In this time the wood just piled up rather than rotted… this was the carboniferous period.via the ever brilliant Reddit
Bashful plant – Mimosa pudica
Mimosa pudica (lit: shy, bashful) is a sensitive plant that closes its leaves upon being touched.
It’s thought that it curls itself up to minimize damage from predators, it may also be that a fast moving plant gives any would be chompers the heeby jeebies.
Jabuticaba – The Brazilian Grape Tree
The Jabuticaba, or Brazilian Grape Tree, fruits upon its trunk.
Photo by robertohoffmann – http://flic.kr/p/2A5kQd
Photo by Carlos Sottovia – http://flic.kr/p/4aHkKi
Man-Eating Plant – The Ya Te Veo
In 1881 intrepid explorer Carl Liche told the tale of a terrible tree. The Ya-Te-Veo that would feast upon the Mdoko tribe of Madagascar.
The German gave a gruesome account of his encounter as the plant slobbered on a filly: “… slender delicate palpi, with the fury of starved serpents, quivered a moment over her head, then as if instinct with demoniac intelligence fastened upon her in sudden coils round and round her neck and arms; then while her awful screams and yet more awful laughter rose wildly to be instantly strangled down again into a gurgling moan, the tendrils one after another, like great green serpents, with brutal energy and infernal rapidity, rose, retracted themselves, and wrapped her about in fold after fold, ever tightening with cruel swiftness and savage tenacity of anacondas fastening upon their prey.”
Thankfully it seems that the Ya-Te-Veo never existed, the Mdoko tribe were certainly not bothered by it either as they too were made up… indeed even intrepid adventurer Carl Liche appears to be the product of an overactive imagination.
The cashew nut
The cashew nut grows outside the fruit, you can eat the fruit like an apple.
Photo by Rogerio Melo _ – http://flic.kr/p/5hkczK
Jul 29
The Plant that sings to Bats
The Cuban vine, Marcgravia evenia, has a bevelled leaf that’s is shaped in such a way as to act as a guide for the bats.
The leaf bounces the sound back to the bat dishing out a nice sugary drinky to the plant’s flappy friend. In return the plant may get pollinated by the bat.
via New Scientist
A strawberry is not a berry, whereas a banana is
A strawberry is not in fact a berry, whereas a banana is.
The world’s smelliest flower
The Titan arum is not only the largest flower in the world, it also has the dubious honour of the title of ‘World’s smelliest flower’. It is quite rightly also known as ‘the corpse flower’ as it smells of the dead to attract its gruesome pollinators. It’s latin name, Amorphophallus titanum, directly translates as ‘giant misshapen penis’.
