“The great tactic of the grasses is to keep their growing tip, the apical bud, below the surface of the ground so that it is not destroyed by grazing animals—and, in fact, grasses, in contrast to all other plants, positively gain from being grazed and grow rank if they are left alone. To find a way of benefiting from the attentions of the predators that come to eat you is a trick indeed; and it explains why the world's grasslands, basically created by members of the single family Poaceae, are almost as extensive worldwide as the world's forests, which contain many thousands of species in scores of families.”
-Colin Tudge, The Tree: A Natural History of What Trees Are, How They Live, and Why They Matter. New York: Crown Publishers, 2006. (135)
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2 comments:
Does the Lorax get a shout out? More where this came from, please!
This is simply the best book.
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