Hydnora: the strangest plant in the world? Flora Obscura with Chris Thorogood скачать в хорошем качестве

Hydnora: the strangest plant in the world? Flora Obscura with Chris Thorogood

In the semi-arid regions of Africa, Madagascar, and southern Arabia, there lives an incredibly strange plant – it is called Hydnora. Unlike most other plants, Hydnora doesn't photosynthesise. In fact, it doesn't even have leaves. Parasitic Hydnora lives underground, stealing its nutrients from the roots of other plants. Every so often, Hydnora emerges above ground to flower. The flowers can burst through pavements, causing damage to infrastructure. Like many flowering plants, Hydnora relies on insect pollination to set seed. But its pollination strategy is a little unconventional. The flowers emit a foul smell to lure in insects, and the insects fall into an underground floral chamber. The dual chamber consists of male and female parts, connected by a small opening. Entrapped, the insects pick up and deliver pollen, fertilising the flower before escaping. Once fertilised, the plant produces fruits, then resumes its subterranean lifestyle. These peculiar plants have eluded cultivation efforts. But as one of the most ancient parasitic flowering plants known to science, it has much to tell us about how plant parasitism evolved. C. Thorogood (2018) Hydnora: The strangest plant in the world? Plants, People, Planet 1:1. doi: 10.1002/ppp3.9 Plants, People, Planet is a new Open Access journal from the New Phytologist Trust. Find out more at http://plantspeopleplanet.org and read this paper in our first issue, live on 5 December!   / plantspplplanet     / plantspeopleplanet