Personality of plants

by Royal Dixon; Franklyn Everett Fitch

The fact is that many plants exhibit all the elemental qualities of human intelligence and also have vague psychic expressions of their own which we only understand in a very limited way.

What causes the radicle or root of the smallest sprouting seedling always to grow down and the plumule or stem always to grow up? It cannot be gravity because that great earth pull would affect both parts equally. This same radicle, when it has developed into a full-fledged root, feels and pushes its way through the earth in a marvellous fashion searching out water and traveling around obstructions with unerring exactness. The slightest pressure will serve to deflect it; aerial roots have been observed to avoid obstacles without actually coming in contact with them. The plants use their roots to feel their way to moisture and nourishment just as a man would feel his way with his hands. The great Darwin, himself, wrote many years ago: “It is hardly an exaggeration to say that the tip of the radicle thus endowed, and having the power of directing the movements of the adjoining parts, acts like the brain of one of the lower animals.”

In the same way, plant tendrils seek and search out the best supports, after the manner of animal tentacles. When fully wound around a prop, they drag the body of the plant up after them.

Practically all plants show a full knowledge of the importance of sunlight to their life processes. They usually strain all their energies and exert all their ingenuity in an effort to display as great a leaf surface as possible. That this action is not always purely instinctive is indicated by the response of certain carnivorous plants to light. Having learned that success in capturing their prey depends upon a static position of their leaves, they make no effort to adjust their parts to strong or concentrated light. This is clearly a case of intelligent adjustment to environment.

It is interesting to note that the plant cells which are sensitive to light often become tired or partially blinded just like the retina of an animal eye. Darwin found that plants kept in darkness were much more responsive to light than those which dwelt habitually in the sunshine.

Many plants are wonderful weather prophets and keepers of time. Their reactions to the coming of night, showers, heat, cold and other natural phenomena show much wisdom. That plants require the rest which accompanies sleep is indicated by the weakened and degenerate condition of individuals which are sometimes forced to exceptionally rapid development by continual exposure to electric light.

A human faculty which few people associate with plants, is an acute sense of taste. How else do the plants know what elements to absorb out of the soil? Certain experiments have enabled investigators to discover marked taste preferences of a number of microscopic plants. Bacteria are exceptionally fond of kali salts. Though they thrive equally well on glycerine, they can be lured from it at any time by the toothsome kali solution.

A sense of taste plays a remarkable part in the fecundation of Moss. The male element is composed of swift-swimming cells equipped with vibratory hairs. When deposited by the wind or other means on the cups of the female flower, they swim about in the moisture until they are eventually enticed to the unfertilized eggs at the bottom by their taste for malic acid. That this is no idle theory can be proved in the laboratory. The seed-animalcules of some of the Ferns also are urged to the act of impregnation by their preference for the sugar in the seed cups.

All through the plant world we see actions and habits which are the reverse of automatism or mere instinctive response. Every plant continually has to meet new and trying conditions, and while its reactions, just like those of man, are frequently in the terms of racial and individual experience, it is constantly called upon to make new and novel decisions.

Consider the intelligence of a wild Service Tree described by Carpenter. As a seed, it sprouted in the crotch of an Oak, and at once sent a lusty root down toward the earth. As it descended the Oak trunk and neared the ground, its further progress was barred by a large stone slab. It is authentically recorded, that, when still one and one-half feet away, the tip of the root, by direct perception or occult means, discovered the presence of the obstruction, and, at once splitting into two equal branches, passed on either side of the stone.