Do climbing plants know where they’re going?

CrowdScience

BBC

Science, Technology

4.8 • 985 Ratings

🗓️ 3 March 2023

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

CrowdScience listener Eric, in New Zealand, has noticed his wisteria growing towards a neighbouring tree. He thinks that it actually knows where it’s going. But how can a plant have a sense of direction?

Plants don’t have the advantage of brains or eyes, but that doesn’t seem to stop them from being clever enough to find out from their environment where to move and how to get there – all while being rooted to the spot.

Marnie Chesterton visits the Natural History Museum and Kew Gardens in London, home to the largest collection of living plants in the world, to discover how plants make their manoeuvres, and talks to botanists and plant biologists for the latest findings on the mysterious life of climbing plants.

Featuring:

Dr Mariane Sousa-Baena, School of Integrative Plant Sciences, Cornell University Dr Ilia Leitch, Senior Research Leader, Kew Gardens Tom Freeth, Head of Plant Records, Kew Gardens Dr Silvia Guerra, Neuroscience of Movement Laboratory, Padua University Professor Christian Fankhauser, Centre for Integrative Genomics, Lausanne University Dr Sandra Knapp, Merit Researcher, Natural History Museum

Transcript

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0:00.0	Take some time for yourself with soothing classical music from the mindful mix, the Science of
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0:08.0	For the last 20 years I've dedicated my career to exploring the science of living a happier more meaningful life and I want
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0:30.3	Hi Namulanta combo here and I'm excited to tell you that my award-winning
0:37.0	podcast, Dear Daughter, is back for his second season and it's available now.
0:42.4	Find out more at the end of this podcast. season and it's available now.
0:43.0	Find out more at the end of this podcast.
0:47.0	This is crowd science from the BBC World Service. I'm Marnie Chasterton and I'm in a warm and humid greenhouse at Hugh Gardens in London.
1:02.0	And I'm here surrounded by loads of really
1:04.8	beautiful climbing plants because of a question about a climbing plant on the
1:08.8	other side of the world. I have a tree which stands some 15 feet high.
1:15.0	Meet Eric from New Zealand.
1:17.0	It puts out tendels towards another tree some 10 feet away.
1:22.0	There's nothing between the two trees. The tendrel goes straight for the other
1:26.7	tree. How does the tree send its tendrel so accurately? It must have some sort of ability to sense it has no organ that I'm
1:37.4	aware of supplying that sense please tell me how this is accomplished can I ask what type of tree it is? Can you describe it for us?
1:45.3	It's a posterior. So beautiful flowers? Yes, yes, but the tendrils go out and they always go out somewhere very specifically, it's very obvious,
1:56.7	whichever way they're going, they're going heading somewhere.
	...

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