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Strangler Fig
Strangler fig is the common name for a number of tropical and subtropical plant species in the genus ''Ficus'', including those that are commonly known as banyans. Some of the more well-known species are: * ''Ficus altissima'' * ''Ficus aurea'', also known as the Florida strangler fig * ''Ficus benghalensis'' * ''Ficus benjamina'' * '' Ficus burtt-davyi'' * ''Ficus citrifolia'' * '' Ficus craterostoma'' * ''Ficus tinctoria'' * ''Ficus macrophylla'' * ''Ficus obliqua'' * ''Ficus virens'' *''Ficus watkinsiana'' *''Ficus henneana'' These all share a common "strangling" growth habit that is found in many tropical forest species, particularly of the genus ''Ficus''. This growth habit is an adaptation for growing in dark forests where the competition for light is intense. Strangler figs suck up the nutrients from its victims, causing them to die eventually. These plants are hemiepiphytes, spending the first part of their life without rooting into the ground. Their seeds, often bird- dis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ficus Watkinsiana On Syzygium Hemilampra-Iluka
''Ficus'' ( or ) is a genus of about 850 species of woody trees, shrubs, vines, epiphytes and hemiepiphytes in the family Moraceae. Collectively known as fig trees or figs, they are native throughout the tropics with a few species extending into the semi-warm temperate zone. The common fig (''F. carica'') is a temperate species native to southwest Asia and the Mediterranean region (from Afghanistan to Portugal), which has been widely cultivated from ancient times for its fruit, also referred to as figs. The fruit of most other species are also edible though they are usually of only local economic importance or eaten as bushfood. However, they are extremely important food resources for wildlife. Figs are also of considerable cultural importance throughout the tropics, both as objects of worship and for their many practical uses. Description ''Ficus'' is a pantropical genus of trees, shrubs, and vines occupying a wide variety of ecological niches; most are evergreen, b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ficus Obliqua
''Ficus obliqua'', commonly known as the small-leaved fig, is a tree in the family Moraceae, native to eastern Australia, New Guinea, eastern Indonesia to Sulawesi and islands in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Previously known for many years as ''Ficus eugenioides'', it is a banyan of the genus ''Ficus'', which contains around 750 species worldwide in warm climates, including the edible fig (''Ficus carica''). Beginning life as a seedling, which grows on other plants (epiphyte) or on rocks (lithophyte), ''F. obliqua'' can grow to high and nearly as wide with a pale grey buttressed trunk, and glossy green leaves. The small round yellow fruit ripen and turn red at any time of year, although ripening peaks in autumn and winter (April to July). Known as a syconium, the fruit is an inverted inflorescence with the flowers lining an internal cavity. ''Ficus obliqua'' is pollinated by two species of fig wasp—'' Pleistodontes greenwoodi'' and '' P. xanthocephalus''. Ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary
Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary is a National Audubon Society sanctuary located in southwest Florida, north of Naples, Florida and east of Bonita Springs, in the United States. The sanctuary was established to protect one of the largest remaining stands of bald cypress (''Taxodium distichum'') and pond cypress (''T. ascendens'') in North America from extensive logging that was ongoing throughout the 1940s and 1950s. History The Corkscrew Cypress Rookery Association was formed in 1954 to protect the area. The National Audubon Society accepted responsibility for management and started constructing the first boardwalk through the swamp in 1955. In all, nearly of wetland was purchased or donated, most of it from or by the owners, Lee Tidewater Cypress Center Co. and Collier Enterprises. In 2018, researchers at the Sanctuary determined that beginning around the year 2000, the amount of groundwater in the park began to diminish. Records have been kept of water levels beginning in 1957, an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Germination
Germination is the process by which an organism grows from a seed or spore. The term is applied to the sprouting of a seedling from a seed of an angiosperm or gymnosperm, the growth of a sporeling from a spore, such as the spores of fungi, ferns, bacteria, and the growth of the pollen tube from the pollen grain of a seed plant. Seed plants Germination is usually the growth of a plant contained within a seed; it results in the formation of the seedling. It is also the process of reactivation of metabolic machinery of the seed resulting in the emergence of radicle and plumule. The seed of a vascular plant is a small package produced in a fruit or cone after the union of male and female reproductive cells. All fully developed seeds contain an embryo and, in most plant species some store of food reserves, wrapped in a seed coat. Some plants produce varying numbers of seeds that lack embryos; these are empty seeds which never germinate. Dormant seeds are viable seeds that do ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seed Dispersal
In Spermatophyte plants, seed dispersal is the movement, spread or transport of seeds away from the parent plant. Plants have limited mobility and rely upon a variety of dispersal vectors to transport their seeds, including both abiotic vectors, such as the wind, and living ( biotic) vectors such as birds. Seeds can be dispersed away from the parent plant individually or collectively, as well as dispersed in both space and time. The patterns of seed dispersal are determined in large part by the dispersal mechanism and this has important implications for the demographic and genetic structure of plant populations, as well as migration patterns and species interactions. There are five main modes of seed dispersal: gravity, wind, ballistic, water, and by animals. Some plants are serotinous and only disperse their seeds in response to an environmental stimulus. These modes are typically inferred based on adaptations, such as wings or fleshy fruit. However, this simplified view may ignor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seed
A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiosperm plants. Seeds are the product of the ripened ovule, after the embryo sac is fertilized by sperm from pollen, forming a zygote. The embryo within a seed develops from the zygote, and grows within the mother plant to a certain size before growth is halted. The seed coat arises from the integuments of the ovule. Seeds have been an important development in the reproduction and success of vegetable gymnosperm and angiosperm plants, relative to more primitive plants such as ferns, mosses and liverworts, which do not have seeds and use water-dependent means to propagate themselves. Seed plants now dominate biological niches on land, from forests to grasslands both in hot and cold climates. The term "seed" also has a general me ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hemiepiphyte
A hemiepiphyte is a plant that spends part of its life cycle as an epiphyte. The seeds of primary hemiepiphytes germinate in the canopy and initially live epiphytically. They send roots downward, and these roots eventually make contact with the ground. Secondary hemiepiphytes are root-climbers that begin as rooted vines growing upward from the forest floor, but later break their connection to the ground. When this happens, they may send down long roots to the ground.Mayo et al. "Araceae" in Kubitzki (1998b ''The families and genera of vascular plants''): "The root climbers and hemiepiphytes normally grow in humid forests, often very high in the canopy. When losing connection with the forest floor, they may send down long roots to the ground; such plants may be referred to as secondary hemiepiphytes. Hemiepiphytes and root climbers cling tightly to the bark of the host with negatively phototropic roots. Skototropism, an orientation movement towards a well-defined dark area, ha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Forest
A forest is an area of land dominated by trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world, incorporating factors such as tree density, tree height, land use, legal standing, and ecological function. The United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) defines a forest as, "Land spanning more than 0.5 hectares with trees higher than 5 meters and a canopy cover of more than 10 percent, or trees able to reach these thresholds ''in situ''. It does not include land that is predominantly under agricultural or urban use." Using this definition, '' Global Forest Resources Assessment 2020'' (FRA 2020) found that forests covered , or approximately 31 percent of the world's land area in 2020. Forests are the predominant terrestrial ecosystem of Earth, and are found around the globe. More than half of the world's forests are found in only five countries (Brazil, Canada, China, Russia, and the United States). The largest share of forests (45 percent) are in th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tropical Forest
Tropical forests (a.k.a. jungle) are forested landscapes in tropical regions: ''i.e.'' land areas approximately bounded by the tropic of Cancer and Capricorn, but possibly affected by other factors such as prevailing winds. Some tropical forest types are difficult to categorise. While forests in temperate areas are readily categorised on the basis of tree canopy density, such schemes do not work well in tropical forests. There is no single scheme that defines what a forest is, in tropical regions or elsewhere.Anatoly Shvidenko, Charles Victor Barber, Reidar Persson et al. 2005 "Millennium Ecosystem Assessment." Ecosystems and human wellbeing: a framework for assessment Washington, DC: Island Press Because of these difficulties, information on the extent of tropical forests varies between sources. However, tropical forests are extensive, making up just under half the world's forests. The tropical domain has the largest proportion of the world’s forests (45 percent), followed by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ficus Henneana
''Ficus henneana'' is a strangler fig only occurring in Australia. Previously considered a variety of ''Ficus superba'' which occurs in China, Japan and parts of South East Asia. The cedar fig or deciduous fig grows in Australia from Milton, New South Wales to northern Queensland and the Northern Territory. The habitat is riverine, littoral or the drier forms of rainforest. The fruit is considered edible for humans, but it is not particularly palatable. Collection and naming This Australian variety was named after Diedrich Henne, who collected this plant at Booby Island in the Torres Strait in 1861. In 1868 it was named ''Ficus henneana''. Joseph Banks also collected this plant from the Booby Island on August 23, 1770. That specimen may have been from the same tree as Henne's specimen, (as the island is so small). Banks' plant was named in 1901 after the Endeavor's artist Sydney Parkinson, (Ficus parkinsonii). However, this name fell out of favour as ''Ficus henneana'' was al ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ficus Watkinsiana
''Ficus watkinsiana'', commonly known as strangler fig, Watkins' fig, nipple fig or the green-leaved Moreton Bay fig is a hemiepiphytic fig that is endemic to Australia. The species exists in three populations—one in northeast Queensland and the others in southeast Queensland and northeast New South Wales. It also has been introduced to Kauai island (Hawaiʻi). The pollinator of this species in Australia is '' Pleistodontes nigriventris'' (Girault). On Kauai island, Port Jackson fig wasps (''Pleistodontes imperialis'') are able to do the job as substitute pollinators. The wasps and the strangler figs have a mutualistic symbiotic relationship. The wasp, ''P. imperialis'', uses the tree to lay eggs into its ostioles, while the tree uses the wasp for pollination. The arrangement of the inner ostioles show convergent evolution in attraction of the wasps. Other species of the strangler fig species have homoplasy of the ostioles, so the wasp is strongly influenced by this genus of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ficus Virens
''Ficus virens'' is a plant of the genus ''Ficus'' found in Pakistan, India, southeast Asia, through Malaysia and into Northern Australia. Its common name is white fig; it is locally known as ''pilkhan'' and in the Kunwinjku language it is called ''manbornde''. Like many figs, its fruits are edible. One of the most famous specimens of this tree is the Curtain Fig Tree of the Atherton Tableland, near Cairns, a popular tourist attraction. Another famous example is the Tree of Knowledge in Darwin. ''Ficus virens'' var. ''sublanceolata'' occurs the subtropical rainforest of northeastern New South Wales, and south eastern Queensland in Australia. Description It is a medium-sized tree which grows to a height of In dry areas and up to tall in wetter areas. It is a fig tree belonging to the group of trees known as strangler figs, which is because its seeds can germinate on other trees and grow to strangle and eventually kill the host tree. It has two marked growth periods in its I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
