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45 Comments
- drewski526, on 07/05/2009, -1/+27http://digg.com/general_sciences/World_s_First_Eve ...
it was on the front page about a week ago - skidork, on 07/05/2009, -2/+11Someone dugg you down for being hopeful. I swear, digg is full of idiots.
- RHollister, on 07/05/2009, -2/+10The comment doesn't make sense really? Just because this plant has large leaves that channel water to the base doesn't mean its applicable for farming crops and will allow the driest of countries to grow their own crops. All the article says is scientists have understood how it works. People probably dugg him down for a comment that implied he did not read the article.
- Philbert, on 07/05/2009, -1/+9Then it's wood that they make pies out of.
- protodon, on 07/05/2009, -1/+6Aren't all plants self watering? I'm pretty sure their roots go where the water is.
- burntcookie90, on 07/05/2009, -1/+5go digg duplicate killer thingy!
- asgardshill, on 07/05/2009, -2/+6Never rub another man's desert rhubarb.
- noahtron, on 07/05/2009, -1/+4sweet batman reference
- mrogi, on 07/05/2009, -0/+3My grandpa was a self watering plant. He had Alzheimer's. He was a vegetable. All he did was lay in bed and piss himself.
- tj007s13, on 07/05/2009, -1/+3Does Home Depot carry these? ;-)
- FitteMas, on 07/05/2009, -0/+2Self irritating plant.."my flowers are small and colorless, i smell less then i used to, my roots are short and dry.
- Choobie, on 07/05/2009, -2/+4It should be noted that digg works in cycles, like a dog chasing its own tail. Sometimes its a short dog, and it catches its tail every week. Other times its a long dog, and it takes about a year.
- Carrot1991, on 07/05/2009, -1/+3Harvest those Genes!
- mpchester, on 07/05/2009, -1/+3It's about time these plants start taking care of themselves!
- Tanktunker, on 07/05/2009, -1/+3Discovered, not engineered.
- hdadeathly, on 07/05/2009, -1/+2It just looks like someone smashed some lettuce in the desert and called it a new plant.
- KJ83, on 07/05/2009, -0/+1Go read DUNE.
- Arseny89, on 07/05/2009, -3/+4This is the second self-watering plant discovered this week!
Or the second time the same story hit the front page this week.
I'm going to go with the latter. - Arseny89, on 07/05/2009, -1/+2I fail to see how seeing the same article twice equates to me not having a life.
- Tanktunker, on 07/05/2009, -1/+2They found a plant with cool leaves, why the ***** would you try to turn this into some sort of political *****?
- Rotzooi, on 07/05/2009, -14/+15This might be a big step forward in our efforts to feed the world, allowing even the driest countries to grow their own crops. Go science!
- jakeburner, on 07/05/2009, -2/+3someone make a pie outta that, quick!
- Azdak, on 07/05/2009, -0/+1I see what you're saying. But ultimately, if the the plant isn't going to increase the gross amount of resources entering the environment, I don't see how it could reverse the desertification process.
- fritzmusic, on 07/05/2009, -0/+1What about root structure to hold the sand in place and not to mention the nutrients it would release back to the earth when it dies?
- whoreable, on 07/05/2009, -0/+1Ever rub another man's rhubarb in the pale moonlight?
- yevkasem, on 07/05/2009, -1/+2this wasn't nearly as cool as the title made it out to be. the plant just has broad leaves, unusual for a desert plant, that help collect rain water and channel it so the plant can suck it up. it still has to get by on 1cm of water per year.
- siwasher, on 07/05/2009, -0/+1The leaves of Gunnera manicata, which are the largest leaves on any herbaceous plant, act as large funnels that catch rain and funnel it to the center of the plant. It's not a desert plant, but one that likes wet ground.
- charleyfeher, on 07/05/2009, -1/+2WHO DESIGNED THIS PLANT?
- fritzmusic, on 07/05/2009, -0/+1It's simple biological mechanics. For example, the reason why Phoenix, Az. doesn't look like the friggin Sahara is because of it's rich, diverse and thriving arid plant biology. If desertification is to be reversed, then one could easily pull from any of these species that thrive in these desert climates and re-introduce them to this silica "tabula rasa" in the Sahra to START to turn the desertification around is basically all I'm sayin.
- aenilius, on 07/05/2009, -1/+2that dupe thing always says my ***** was already posted, when it never is, and yet every ***** day i see about 4 dupe threads on the front page.
- protoopus, on 07/05/2009, -1/+1Another remarkable redwood adaptation is their self-watering system. On most mornings, two events coincide which result in water dripping from the needles of the redwoods onto the roots. The first event is coastal fog. The fog creeps into coastal valleys and canyons where the redwoods grow. At the same time, the trees are drawing water from the soil through the trunk to the needles and then transpiring the water to the air. When the fog hits this humidity, it condenses on the redwoods' flat, waxy needles. As water builds up, it drips from the needles onto the soil beneath the tree. Amazingly, the roots of the tree extend to about the point where the branches extend, soaking up the water as it falls.
source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/ge ...
the rhubarb is the first self-watering DESERT plant. - Azdak, on 07/05/2009, -2/+2um....no. The thing doesn't actually increase the amount of water that hits the ground. It just hogs an amount that's disproportionate to its base.
- realcoolguy9022, on 07/05/2009, -0/+0The sweet thing about this one is that it funnels in the water with it's big waxy leaves to it's roots. This plant can take an amount of water that would normally only go 1 cm deep into the ground, missing most root systems of other plants, funnel 16 times that amount of water, straight down to it's root system.
I thought I was cool when I was 12 and made a snowfort with ramps that returned snoballs that hit the walls to a convenient little cubby in my snowfort... Anyway, I iced the front of it, and it was epic! This plant is cool too though.
So no, not all plants actively (ok technically it's a passive system) funnel water to their roots that would normally not penetrate the soil even. - ZurMacht, on 07/05/2009, -1/+1No one.
- hudef, on 07/05/2009, -1/+1Apart from the funnel effect, the other big advantages to this plant's design are the shading/mulching effect of the prostrate leaf habit, minimizing moisture loss and deterring the germination of nearby competitive plant species. This habit also makes it very wind resistant. Unfortunately, the plant (Rheum palaestinum) is actually in the rhubarb family thus the leaves are very toxic.
- inactive, on 07/05/2009, -1/+1Maybe this can be seen as an example of the fact that life adapts to its environment, so we don't need to worry about the climate changing (as it has been doing since Earth began).
- alienufo, on 07/06/2009, -1/+1kill it with fire
- fritzmusic, on 07/05/2009, -2/+1Okay so populate the Sahara full of these things and after a few generations maybe we could see a miniscule start to reverse desertification?
- ROFLance, on 07/05/2009, -2/+1I doubt this is the "world's first". There are probably extinct species of self-watering plants. I mean, if it took us this long to recognize this one, I'm sure there were other variants throughout Earth's history.
- noahtron, on 07/05/2009, -2/+1tankturner, what do you think the next step is?
(pro GM, btw) - jigschizophrant, on 07/06/2009, -1/+0mmmmmmmmmmm!!! self feeding. like self masturbation! we are breast feeding. yet, we eat dariy. we eat meat. we eat grass. we eat chemicals. we are omnivores. ..This plant is amazing. Why can't humans do that way? We are inferior!
- spvn, on 07/05/2009, -8/+6I wonder how many people on Digg are actually going to give a damn about this.
- skidork, on 07/05/2009, -6/+2This just in: you have no life.
- syntaxgs, on 07/05/2009, -8/+1plus I,m pretty sure rubarb can,t be eat
it not eadible,,,,it,s more like wood - Nboy514, on 07/05/2009, -10/+2In before anti-GM radicals.
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