We might worry seedlings won’t come up. But the thing we don’t give thought to is the notion they might come up the wrong way. Roots waggling above ground like legs of an upended can-can dancer and leaves groping their way through the darkness of the soil like a lost Alice.
The reason for this – Geotropism; a plant’s response to gravity. Roots go down, shoots come up.
The root is positively geotropic meaning it grows in the direction of gravity.
The shoot/stem negatively geotropic; it grows opposite to the gravitational force.
This means the plant always gets its survival mechanisms the right way round. Roots go down for water; leaves come up for light.
All this happens regardless of the seed’s position when it’s sown. Imagine it being up to us to position it correctly…. rotate right, rotate left, up a little, down a little. Given all life is sustained by plants – it’s a good job seed has its own built-in weeble processor and doesn’t need to rely on our evolutionary Golden Shot wielding ability.
After all, I still sometimes find myself at the stage of wondering why the words ‘ open this way up’ have been printed upside down, realising only where the real error lies, when the box’s contents, in a positively unhelpful geotropic manner, hit the floor.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I really must congratulate you on two things! Firstly, the great sentence ‘Roots waggling above ground like legs of an upended can-can dancer and leaves groping their way through the darkness of the soil like a lost Alice.’, which is quite indescribably horrific; it really conjures up some sinister images. Um… which is obviously a good thing… right?
Secondly, I just love the phrase ‘weeble processor’. I shall be using it next time I fall over in Tesco.
Thank You ! I’m so glad you liked it – and for letting me know. How my mind conjures things – no idea. Sometimes – as when faced, as I was this weekend, with last year’s dismantled 3 tier growhouse, no instructions and the sort of mind that looks blankly at the assorted parts, pushes them round for a bit to no avail before pushing off for a cup of tea… and hoping that by the time I come back – the words ‘self assembly’ will have been taken literally by the thing itself – I wish it worked differently but then on the other hand – flat pack construction rarely garners congratulations (perhaps it’s meant to be its own reward !) – so perhaps I’ll happily now stick with what I’ve got !