The Dalles daily chronicle. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1890-1948, 1891-11-02
EATERS OF CARBON
Trees and Plants Grow Out of the Air.
Not from the Ground

EATERS OF CARBON i
Trees and Plants Grow Out of the Air.
Not from the Ground
Take an ordinary seltzer water siphon
and empty it till only a few drops re-
main in the bottom. Then the bottle is
full of gas, and that gas. which will
rush out with squirt when you press
the knob, is the stuff that plants eat
raw material of life both animal and
vegetable. The tree grows and lives by
taking in the carbonic acid from the air
and soIidifying its carbon; the animal
grows and lives by taking the solidified
carbon from the plant and converting it
once more into carbonic acid
That, in its ideally simple form. is the
Iliad in nutshell, the core and kernel
of biology The whole cycle of life is
one eternal seesaw, First the plant col
lects it's carbon compounds from the air
in the oxidized state: it deoxidizes and
rebuilds them. and then the animal pro
ceeds to burn them by slow combustion
within its own body and to turn them
loose upon the air once more oxidized
After which the plant starts again on
the same road as before, and the animal
also recommences da capo And so on
ad infinitum
But the point which want particu-
Iarly to emphasize here is just this: That
trees and plants don't grow out of the
ground at all. US most people do vainly
talk, but directly ont of the air, and
that when they die or get consumed
they return once more to the atmosphere
from which they were taken Trees I'M
deniably eat carbon.
Of course therefore. all the ordinary
unseientifc conceptions of how plants
feed are absolutely erroneous. Vegetable
physiology indeed got beyond those
conceptions IL good hundred years ago
But il usually takes hundred years for
the world at large 10 make up its lee
way Trees don't suck up their nutri-
ment by the roots. they don't derive
their food from the soil, they don't need
to be fed like babies through tube with
terrestrial solids The solitary instance
of an orchid hung mp by Il string in i
conservatory on Il piece of bark ought to
be sufficient at once to dlspel forever
this strange delusion-if people eve1
thought; but. of course. they don't think
4 mean other people.
The true mouths and stomachs OF
plants are not to be found in the roots
but in the green leaves: their true food
is not sucked up from the soil, but Is In
hailed through tiny channels from the
air: the mass of their material is carbon
as we can all see visibly to the naked eye
when a log Of wood is reduced to char
coal. and that carbon the leaves them
selves drink in by d thousand small
green mouths from the atmosphere
around them
Bnt how about the juice, the sap, tn
qualities of the soil. the manure required
is the incredulous cry of other people
What is the use of the roots, and espe
cially of the rootlets, if they are not tn
mouths and supply tubes of the plants
s Well, | plainly perceive can get IN
forrader, ''li11e the farmer with his claret
7 till I've answered that question, pro
visionally at least; so will say here g
once, without further ado, that the plaI
requires drink as well US food, and til
roots are the mouths that supply it wit
water
They. also suck up n few other thing
as we'll which are necessary indeed, bI
far from forming the bulk of the nutr
ment Many plants. however, don
need any roots at all, while none CO
get on without leaves as mouths an
stomachs-that is to say, no true plan
like plants, for some parasite plants a
practically to all intents and purpos
animals. To put it briefly, every pla
has one set of aerial mouths to suck
carbon, and many plants have anoth
set of subterranean mouths as well,
suck up water and mineral constituent
-Cornhill Magazine.