Water is awesome because it can be pulled up a tree as tall as 100 metres (330 feet)!
Forests of fear
Forests of fear Two scientists from Indiana University have
discovered that trees are bad parents! Alissa Packer and Keith Clay
wondered why there are so many different types of trees in natural
forests and set out to discover the answer. They noticed that
seedlings of a tree did badly if they sprouted near their parent
tree, and that seedlings doing well were several metres away from
their parent. To find out why this was happening, the researchers
took a soil sample from near the parent tree, and a sample from far
away from the parent tree and tried to grow seedlings in it. The
seedlings planted in the soil from far away did well but the
seedlings planted in the soil from near the adult tree died. The
reason for this is that adult trees attract pathogens, or diseases,
which specifically kill their offspring if they root nearby.
Offspring of other trees, however, will live in that soil. Trees
may not be deliberately killing their young, but they attract
diseases that do! 18 MARCH 2000
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