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Zusammenfassung von The Triumph of Seeds

Name: The Triumph of Seeds
Rating: 4.3 (27 reviews)
Author: Thor Hanson

Thor Hanson

How Grains, Nuts, Kernels, Pulses & Pips Conquered the Plant Kingdom and Shaped Human History

4.3 (27 Bewertungen)

13 Min.

Inhaltsübersicht

The Triumph of Seeds
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Kernaussage 1 von 6

What’s in it for me? Find out what’s so great about seeds.

Seed plants are the winners of the plant world. They make up the vast majority of our flora, although other plants – such as those that grow from spores – have been around for millions of years longer.

And these seed plants shape our everyday lives, too. Just imagine an ordinary morning. You wake up in cotton sheets. Cotton starts out as the soft, fluffy stuff that surrounds the seeds of the cotton plant. Your soap or shampoo and your toothpaste contain oils that stem from seed plants – like olives and mint. Your coffee is made from the seeds of the coffee plant, and your granola, well, you get the picture.

Interestingly, seed plants owe much of their success and their popularity to something very unassuming: their seeds. These blinks will tell you all about them.

You’ll also find out

how trees have made us their servants;
why the size of a seed is so crucial; and
about one of the oldest organisms on Earth.

Every seed consists of three parts and, though they vary in how they develop, all seeds rely on water.

The world is full of an immense variety of plants that spring from a small seed – plants that then go on to produce their own seeds. Just compare a walnut to a peanut to see how different seeds can be.

Yet, despite their different appearances, all seeds consist of three parts: an embryo, a nutrient tissue and a coat.

To better understand these parts, you can think of a seed’s embryo as the baby, the nutrient tissue around the embryo as the baby’s lunch and the coat as a sort of protective shell.

Seeds begin to show their differences when it’s time to germinate. Germination is the phase that begins when a seed takes its first drink of water, or imbibes, and ends when the embryonic root sprouts forth.

Now, this process can vary depending on the seed. The common germination procedure is for the coat to open up, the baby to slowly eat its lunch and then grow roots and sprout upward.

But in other seeds, the baby may eat its lunch before the coat opens. In this case, the baby uses the energy from its meal to form embryonic seed leaves, or cotyledons, to keep the young plant healthy during difficult times, when sun and water are in short supply.

And if you’ve eaten a peanut or a walnut, then you know what seed leaves look and taste like. When you crack open a peanut’s shell and remove the thin layer around it, you’ll see that the peanut is made up of two distinct halves; these are the seed leaves.

But regardless of variety, seeds need water to grow.

Different seeds may imbibe at different times during the germination process, but every seed is designed to grow roots – and this important step requires water.

So, if the seed is unable to imbibe, the seed will lie dormant.

Seeds evolved from spores to overcome difficulties in reproduction and adapt to dry climates.

Did you know that most of our coal originates from a single geological period in Earth’s history? It’s called the Carboniferous era, and it began about 359.2 million years ago and lasted for the next 60 million.

Experts used to think that Earth’s entire climate was warm and rainy during this time, which created swampy landscapes that were dominated by the spore plants that thrive in such conditions. This theory suggests that seed plants didn’t arrive until the climate dried up, which they believe happened during the following period, the Permian era.

All seeds die, but some are able to lie dormant for years – even centuries.

Hibernation isn’t just a way for bears to make it through a cold winter. Seeds do something similar. But instead of just one season, seeds can lie dormant for years, or, given the right conditions, much, much longer.

This is what the seeds you buy at the store are doing. Whether they’re grass seeds waiting to be spread around your backyard, or herb and flower seeds for your garden, all of these seeds have matured and are awaiting germination.

Seeds evolved to defend and disperse themselves – with the help of unwitting creatures.

It would seem that seeds are pretty well protected if they can last thousands of years. But it’s not just the normal wear and tear of age that seeds are designed to withstand. They also have defenses against the mice, squirrels and other rodents and animals that love a tasty seed treat.

These creatures actually represented an evolutionary dilemma for seed plants. On the one hand, the plants need to defend themselves, but, on the other, these creatures can provide a helpful way to disperse their seeds.

Many seeds travel and disperse due to fruit that attracts both animals and humans.

Rodents and birds aren’t the only ones who enjoy the fruit that a plant keeps its seeds in. It’s difficult for anyone not to be attracted by the sweet scents, appealing texture and wide variety of flavors offered by cherries, peaches, apples, nectarines and so forth.

This is no accident. Since their purpose is to act as bait for animals to disperse the seeds, fruits need to be attractive and appealing.

Seed manipulation, intended to benefit companies and consumers, has some questionable consequences.

As science has progressed, one of the more fascinating developments has been the controversial ability to manipulate genetic material. While this makes news all the time when it comes to animals and humans, it’s also a complicated subject for seeds.

Scientists actually began manipulating seeds decades ago, and in the mid-twentieth century they created seedless young: a method of breeding seed plants to create infertile offspring.

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Worum geht es in The Triumph of Seeds?

The Triumph of Seeds (2015) tells the amazing story of the influence of seeds. Find out how plants have managed to endure and evolve over the course of Earth’s long history and how they manipulated both man and animal into doing their bidding.

Bestes Zitat aus The Triumph of Seeds

When spore plants have sex, they usually do it in dark, wet places, and quite often with themselves.

—Thor Hanson

Wer The Triumph of Seeds lesen sollte

Students of biology, ecology or agriculture
Botanists
Readers who love natural science or gardening

Über den Autor

Dr. Thor Hanson is a conservation biologist from the Pacific Northwest and an award-winning author. A Guggenheim Fellow, his other books include Feathers and The Impenetrable Forest.

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