Norwich bulletin. [volume] (Norwich, Conn.) 1895-2011, 1914-01-01

and waterfowl help to carry them
about.
Birds are very useful as carriers of
seeds, because they are such great
travellers, and SO plants try to attract
them with conspicuously colored and
deliciously favored fruits. The seed is
hidden in the fruit and the plant takes
great care that it shall not be injured
when the fruit is eaten, 1t is either
hard and bitter or else it is encased in
stony covering like the plum, so
that 1t passes through the birds body
undigested, or is thrown away
The mistletoe, which never works for
living, but grows as a parasite upon
various tress. has a berry with very
sticky juice, and the seeds stick to the
beaks of the birds that eat it, so that
they have to rub them off on the bark
and in the crotohes of trees. This is
precisely what the miStletoe wants, be-
cause 1t could not grow anywhere else,
Birds also carry seeds in their feathers
and on their feet. Darwin grew eighty
two plants from the mud on the foot OF
one partridge, and from three table
spoonfuls of mud taken from the bot
tom of a sheet of water frequented by
birds he terminated 537 seeds.
Nut-bearing plants are not so sue
cessful in getting their seeds distri-
/ buted as are those that bear fruits, be-
cause, instead of having the seed wrap
ped up in something good to eat the
seed itself is good to eat. Plants are
very much like people in some ways.
Some give their children a good start
in life. while others fling them on the
world with scar ely any help, and nut
trees are good parents. Each little
germ is provided with d lot of food on
which it can live for a consid erabIe
time after it begins to grow. But I'M
fortunately, this food is just as good
for animals as it is for plants, and so
the nut-bearing tree tries to protect
Its seed from animals. instead of ask
ing them to come and eat, as the fruit
trees do. Nuts are green when on the
tree, so that they may not be seen
among the green leaves, and brown
when they fall so that we do not notice
them among the dead ones. They are
also wrapped up in hard and stony
coats, which are often very hard to
crack, as we all know. Nevertheless,
many animals live upon nuts, and no
DOUBT carry away some that they do
not eat. Squirrels often hide nuts for
winter use and then forget to go and
eat them. So the nut tree gets some
Of its seeds scattered after all.
Some plants are their own carriers.
The tumble weed, which grows in dry
and sandy places, has very small
root, and in the fall, when 1T is done
growing, and the little rootlets, whose
business it Is to forage for the plant,
dry up, a slight gust of wind is all that
I is necessary to tear it from its moor
ings, Then it goes tumbling across the
fields, scattering seeds on it's way,
Still other plants shoot their seeds
as far as they can from the spot where
they grow. Some of the Violets squeeze
their seeds from the pods, just as we
squeeze a moist apple seed from be-
tween the fingers. The geranium shoots
it's seeds by another method, and the
touch me-not has still different way.
In the tropics plants of this class
sometimes shoot their seeds with such
violence that anyone in the neighbor-
hood is liable to be seriously injured
In all these ways and many others
nature scatteFs her seeds and keeps
the earth beuntiful and fruitful and if
We think of these things the next time
we get bl1rrs in our clothes perhaps we
shall not mind them so much,