Plant is a living being
Do plants have properties that animals differ from inanimate nature. If plants also feed, breathe, reproduce and grow, feel and move, then, consequently, they are living beings.
We know that plants eat. On the black earth, fertile soil, plants grow well, because there is a lot of food for them. On the contrary, on bad soil (clayey, sandy), in which there are few nutrients, plants grow poorly. Such soil is usually fertilized, adding to it manure, chernozem.
Plants reproduce and grow. They blossom, bring seeds, and if seeds fall into the ground, new plants grow from them. Moreover, representatives of the flora grow in the same way as fauna, that is, they take food and process into their own body – stems, leaves, flowers, fruits. Finally, we know that plants die, wither.
It remains to prove that plants breathe, they can feel and produce movements.
The ability to breathe is easily proved by experience. Recall what happens when breathing? Light absorbs oxygen
But did carbon dioxide turn out? To make sure of this, we plug the bottle with a stopper with two holes; in one hole we will insert a funnel, in another – a curved glass tube with a rubber tube on it. Rubber tube is lowered into a glass with lime water and we pour water into the bottle through a funnel. Air from the bottle will come out through the rubber tube through the lime water, and the water will cloud. So, in the bottle, instead of oxygen, carbon dioxide was formed. Thus we see that plants also breathe: they absorb oxygen from the air and release carbon dioxide.
The ability to feel
At first glance, we do not notice
In South America grows a small plant – a bashful mimosa. If you touch her little leaves lightly, they immediately begin to fold quickly and cuddle together. After a while, the leaves again open. If you strike the mimosa leaf more strongly, it falls all the way down and as if pressed against the stem. When the entire plant shakes, all the leaves fold and fall down. Mimoza feels a touch and is peculiarly hiding from the impact. It is worth to go to the rain, as the mimosa immediately folds the leaves, and the rain can not damage them. Quite the same, the mimosa is sensitive to light: at sunset the leaves curl, and with the sun rises again.
In North America, grows another small plant – a flytrap, which has a similar sensitivity. The leaves of the flycatcher end in a small round plate consisting of two halves. At the edges of the plate is seated with thin and sharp denticles, and on each half there are three thin setae. It is only necessary to touch one of these bristles, as both halves of the leaf quickly collapse. The leaves serve as flycatchers for catching insects, which it feeds on.
A similar plant grows in the northern part of Russia and is called sundew. There is sundew fairly often. The reddish leaves look like flat plaques and are covered with red hairs, longer along the edges and short in the middle. Each hair ends with a small head that emits a sticky, transparent juice. The juice shines in the sun like dew, for which sundew and got its name.
Insects, attracted by droplets of juice, fall on the leaves of the sundew, and as soon as one touches the head of a hair covered with juice, it immediately sticks to it. And then the hairs slowly begin to straighten and bend down to the caught insect. Soon they cover it with their heads, and then the whole leaf clenches into a fist, closing an insect. 2-3 days later the leaf opens again, but there is already no insect on them; there are only wings, legs, solid scales.
It is interesting that a sundew leaf feels food. If, for example, put a grain of sand on the leaf, then the hairs will close it, but after 20-30 minutes they will open and slowly push the sand from the sheet.
Ability to make movements
In the previous article, we said that plants are capable of making movements. The brightest examples are the flytrap, sundew and mimosa. But do they have sensitivity and can ordinary plants produce movements?
Take the young seedlings of watercress and put them in a box, which we close the top with a book. On the side of the box, cut a small hole and put it in a window hole to the light. After about an hour we will see that all the branches of watercress curl and turn to the light. Consequently, they feel the light and are drawn to it.
All other plants also feel the light completely. Look at the room flowers: their leaves are facing the light, to the window. Turn the flower so that its leaves are turned into the room, and in 2-3 days the leaves again turn to the light.
Many plants feel cold. In this connection, let us turn to the leaves of the clover (kashka) day and night, when the sun goes down and the air becomes cold. In the afternoon the triple branches of the clover are wide open; in the evening they are closed: two of them are pressed against each other, and the third covers them like a lid. Make it clover leaves then to give less warmth. This folding of clover leaves is called “clover sleep”.
Fall asleep at night and leaves of white acacia, beans and some other plants.
Even more sensitive are the flowers of many plants. White coppice, forest windswept, some bells, carrots and many others, at night, as well as in inclement weather, drop their flowers. Dandelion, daisies, mother and stepmother, saffron, bell, close the flowers at nightfall. Sunflower, pansies in the course of the whole day turn the flowers after the sun. Watch yourself how the flowers of a dandelion, daisies are covered at night and in inclement weather, and also pay attention to how the pansies turn to the sun.
Thus, we see that our ordinary plants are able to feel and produce simple movements.
Now it is clear to us that plants have absolutely similar distinctive features from inanimate nature, as animals. Plants eat, breathe, reproduce, grow, feel, move and die. Consequently, plants are the same living beings as animals.
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