L. H. Bailey

“ Even in the same species or kind, individual plants differ in colour; and this individuality usually distinguishes the plant year by year. That is, an oak which is maroon red this autumn is likely to exhibit that range of colour every year. The autumn colour is associated with the natural maturity and death of the leaf, but it is most brilliant in long and open [14] falls—largely because the foliage ripens more gradually and persists longer in such seasons. It is probable that the autumn tints are of no utility to the plant. Autumn colours are not caused by frost. ”

“ In all teaching of plants and animals to beginners, the plants themselves and the animals themselves should be made the theme, rather than any amount of definitions and of mere study in books. Books will be very useful in guiding the way, in arranging the subjects systematically, and in explaining obscure points; but if the pupil does not know the living and growing plants when he has completed his course in botany, he has not acquired very much that is worth the while. ”

“ No two roots are alike; that is, they vary among themselves as stems and leaves do. Each kind of plant has its [37] own form or habit of root (Fig. 39) . Carefully wash away the soil from the roots of any two related plants, as oats and wheat, and note the differences in size, depth, direction, mode of branching, number of fibrils, colour, and other features. The character of the root system often governs the treatment that the farmer should give the soil in which the plant or crop grows. ”

“ It is well to acquaint the beginner at first with the main features of the entire plant rather than with details of its parts. He should at once form a mental picture of what the plant is, and what are some of its broader adaptations to the life that it leads. In this book, the pupil starts with the entire branch or the entire plant. It is sometimes said that the pupil cannot grasp the idea of struggle for existence until he knows the names and the uses of the different parts of the plant. ”

“ The root hold of a plant is very strong. Slowly pull upwards on some plant, and note how firmly it is anchored in the soil.
Roots have power to choose their food; that is, they do not absorb all substances with which they come in contact. They do not take up great quantities of useless or harmful materials, even though these materials may be abundant in the soil; but they may take up a greater quantity of some of the plant-foods than the plant can use to advantage. Plants respond very quickly to liberal feeding,—that is, to the application of plant-food to the soil (Fig 40) . ”

“ Most plants prefer that the cutting be made of the soft or growing parts (called “wood” by gardeners) , of which the “slips” of geranium and coleus are examples. Others grow equally well from cuttings of the hard or mature parts or wood, as currant and grape; and in some instances this mature wood may be of roots, as in the blackberry. In some cases cuttings are made of tubers, as in the Irish [122] potato (Fig. 60) . Pupils should make cuttings now and then. If they can do nothing more, they can make cuttings of potato, as the farmer does; and they can plant them in a box in the window. ”

“ In some cases, as in crocuses, the flowers seem to precede the leaves; but the leaves that made the food for these flowers grew the preceding year.
The Plant Generation.—The course of a plant’s life, with all the events through which the plant naturally passes, is known as the plant’s life-history. The life-history embraces various stages, or epochs, as dormant seed, germination, growth, flowering, fruiting. Some plants run their course in a few weeks or months, and some live for centuries.
The entire life period of a plant is called a generation. ”

“ A fern is fertilized but once in its lifetime. The “fern” bears the spore, the spore gives rise to the prothallus, and the egg-cell of the prothallus (when fertilized) gives rise to the fern.
A similar alternation of generations runs all through the vegetable kingdom, although there are some groups of plants in which it is very obscure or apparently wanting. It is very marked in ferns and mosses. In algæ (including the seaweeds) the gametophyte is the “plant,” as the non-botanist knows it, and the sporophyte is inconspicuous. ”

“ Woody or ligneous plants usually live longer than herbs. Those that remain low and produce several or [19] many similar shoots from the base are called shrubs, as lilac, rose, elder, osier (Fig. 13) . Low and thick shrubs are bushes. Plants that produce one main trunk and a more or less elevated head are trees (Fig. 14) . All shrubs and trees are perennial.
Every plant makes an effort to propagate, or to perpetuate its kind; and, as far as we can see, this is the end for which the plant itself lives. The seed or spore is the final product of the plant. ”

“ Education that is not applicable, that does not put the pupil into touch with the living knowledge and the affairs of his time, may be of less educative value than the learning of a trade in a shop. We are beginning to learn that the ideals and the abilities should be developed out of the common surroundings and affairs [vii] of life rather than imposed on the pupil as a matter of abstract unrelated theory. ”

“ Every pupil should undertake at least one simple experiment in selection of seed. He may select kernels from the best plant of corn in the field, and also from the poorest plant,—having reference not so much to mere incidental size and vigour of the plants that may be due to accidental conditions in the field, as to the apparently constitutional strength and size, number of ears, size of ears, perfectness of ears and kernels, habit of the plant as to suckering, and the like. The seeds may be saved and sown the next year. ”

“ The extent of root surface is usually very large, for the feeding roots are fine and very numerous. An ordinary plant of Indian corn may have a total length of root (measured as if the roots were placed end to end) of several hundred feet.
The fine feeding roots are most abundant in the richest part of the soil. They are attracted by the food materials. Roots often will completely surround a bone or other morsel. When roots of trees are exposed, observe that most of them are horizontal and lie near the top of the ground. Some roots, as of willows, extend far in search of water. ”

“ The difference in time of ripening may be an hour or two, or it may be a day. The ripening of the stamens and the pistils at different times is known as dichogamy, and flowers of such character are said to be dichogamous. There is little chance for dichogamous flowers to pollinate themselves. Many flowers are imperfectly dichogamous—some [147] of the anthers mature simultaneously with the pistils, so that there is chance for self-pollination in case foreign pollen does not arrive. Even when the stigma receives pollen from its own flower, cross-fertilization may result. ”

“ The green plant secures its carbon from the air. In other words, much of the solid matter of the plant comes from one of the gases of the air. By volume, carbon dioxide forms only a small fraction of 1 per cent. of the air. It would be very disastrous to animal life, however, if this percentage were much increased, for it excludes the life-giving oxygen. Carbon dioxide is often called “foul gas.” It may accumulate in old wells, and an experienced person will not descend into such wells until they have been tested with a torch. ”

“ Epidermis.—The outer or epidermal cells of leaves do not bear chlorophyll, but are usually so transparent that the green mesophyll can be seen through them. They often become very thick-walled, and are in most plants devoid of all protoplasm except a thin layer lining the walls, the cavities being filled with cell sap. This sap is sometimes coloured, as in the under epidermis of begonia leaves. It is not common to find more than one layer of epidermal cells forming each surface of a leaf. The epidermis serves to retain moisture in the leaf and as a general protective covering. ”

“ Should the soil of fields or greenhouses be much colder than the air, the plant suffers. When in a warm atmosphere, or in a dry atmosphere, plants need to absorb much water from the soil, and the roots must be warm if the root-hairs are to supply the water as rapidly as it is needed. If the roots are chilled, the plant may wilt or die. ”

“ Transpiration.—Much more water is absorbed by the roots than is used in growth, and this surplus water passes from the leaves into the atmosphere by an evaporation process known as transpiration. Transpiration takes place more abundantly from the under surfaces of leaves, and through the pores or stomates. A sunflower plant of the height of a man, during an active period of growth, gives off a quart of water per day. A large oak tree may transpire 150 gallons per day during the summer. ”

“ The present tendency in secondary education is away from the formal technical completion of separate subjects and toward the developing of a workable training in the activities that relate the pupil to his own life. In the natural science field, the tendency is to attach less importance to botany and zoology as such, and to lay greater stress on the processes and adaptations of life as expressed in plants and animals. ”

“ The most prominent of these parts are root, stem, leaf, flower, fruit, and seed. Familiar plants differ wonderfully in size and shape,—from fragile mushrooms, delicate waterweeds and pond-scums, to floating leaves, soft grasses, coarse weeds, tall bushes, slender climbers, gigantic trees, and hanging moss.
The Stem Part.—In most plants there is a main central part or shaft on which the other or secondary parts are borne. This main part is the plant axis. Above ground, in most plants, the main plant axis bears the branches, leaves, and flowers; below ground, it bears the roots. ”

“ When the cutting is inserted in a plant, it is no longer called a cutting but a scion; and the plant in which it is inserted is called the stock. Fruit trees are grafted in order that a certain variety or kind may be perpetuated, as a Baldwin or Ben Davis variety of apple, Seckel or Bartlett pear, Navel or St. Michael orange.
Plants have preferences as to the stocks on which they will grow; but we can find out what their choice is only by making the experiment. The pear grows well on the quince, but the quince does not thrive on the pear. ”

“ When the spore germinates, it sends out a delicate thread that grows rapidly in length and forms very many branches that soon permeate every part of the substance on which the plant grows (b, Fig. 272) . One of these threads is termed a hypha. All the threads together form the mycelium of the fungus. The mycelium disorganizes the material in which it grows, and thus the mucor plant (Fig. 271) is nourished. It corresponds physiologically to the roots and the stems of other plants.
Fig. 272.—Spores of Mucor, some germinating. ”