Plants and their children

by Frances Theodora Parsons

ROOT HAIRS

Carefully pull up one of your bean plants and look at its root (Fig. [108]).

You see that the root grows downward from the lower part of the stem.

Fig. 108

This bean root looks not unlike a bunch of dirty threads, some quite thick, others very thin. If you look at these thread-like roots in a good light, perhaps you may be able to see growing from them a quantity of tiny hairs.

Now, what is the use of such a root as this?

Surely some of you are able to guess at the object of this root, and I will help the others to the answer.

Give a firm though gentle tug to one of the larger plants,—one of those that are growing in the pot of earth.

Does it come out easily in your fingers?