There’s a trigger warning on ZeFrank’s recent video: “True Facts is not appropriate for children, nor for adults who don’t act like children.” But in fact this 11+ minute video is perfectly appropriate for kids. (There’s a commercial from 3:15 to 4:22).
It’s about plants that disperse their seeds, spores, or pollen explosively, including liverworts, dogwoods, mosses, witch hazel, oats, and sundry others.
Not only do the explosions disperse the seeds (clearly an adaptive trait; you want your genes to be away from your plot, where they compete with you), but in some cases the explosion has evolved to give the dispersing seeds an orientation that makes them go further. And some of the spores, as in horsetails, have little arms that curl with changes in humidity that allow them to “walk” along the ground! (Oat seeds can do the same thing, hopping with their “awns” and then twisting themselves into the ground.) As usual, the photography is amazing, so don’t miss this one. The extensive research is documented by a list of references at the end.
In this video ZeFrank doesn’t mention evolution or natural selection, but of course it’s implicit in these amazing and diverse adaptations for dispersal. I, for one, hardly knew anything about these features, and was delighted to see all these complicated results of natural selection, which of course is cleverer than you are. Seeds that plant themselves by screwing themselves into the dirt!
h/t: Mary
It is a great thing, such videos have developed out of our modern era –
Enlightenment Now!
And a laugh or two doesn’t hurt!
Thank you Jerry for another interesting story.
That was fun. As a lab grunt I got to take soil samples, wash them, strain them, and once they dried, take them under a scope and identify all the seed species. I got to discover some truly ingenious strategies (on the part of seeds) for “getting around”, so to speak. Nature is truly amazing.
Very good. He also has one out about eels, which I believe is also very new.
Very interesting, thanks for posting!
Note that there are lots of slightly racy comments and such that would not be appropriate for certain ages, such as references alluding to screwing and technical names that he gives as “Noneofyourf*ing Business.” Maybe any younger person sophisticated enough to appreciate the great biology in here would be old enough to take these jokes in stride, though.
Very cute video! If you like this sort of thing, check out this video of liverwort sperm dispersal: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALGDLzWcvnU
Big hit at our house. Two thumbs up.
(The eels were good, too.)
That was great! I needed something enjoyable today.
I have seen (and heard) various plant seed pods explode, but never thought much about the mechanism.
Fascinating.