Meat, anyone?

[OzRich]

Very Interesting. Never heard of plants communicating via chemical release. That certainly puts a whole new perspective on things.

And that bit from Marciniak was interesting, that describes the dietary adjustments I've been making to a T. Fun lessons, no?

I remember watching once documentary about Africa. In it there was this particular animal munching on a tree. The tree immediately started to release certain chemical, which carried by wind affected other trees of the same species in the area in such a way that they released another chemical that made them unpalatable to the animal. I don't remember which species of plant or animal (I think it was giraffe) it was, only the concept of plant defense is in my memory.
Food for thought eh ?

 

[Tigersoap]

I remember watching once documentary about Africa. In it there was this particular animal munching on a tree. The tree immediately started to release certain chemical, which carried by wind affected other trees of the same species in the area in such a way that they released another chemical that made them unpalatable to the animal. I don't remember which species of plant or animal (I think it was giraffe) it was, only the concept of plant defense is in my memory.
Food for thought eh ?

I believe you're talking about the acacia, which releases tannin to avoid that the animal consume too many leaves.
But, it is not a defense mechanism to avoid being eaten, it is more of a protective measure to assure the survival of the plant itself and of the ecosystem.
This way the animal must keep moving and find an other area to keep eating so the amount of leaves never dwindles to nothing.
The balance is thus preserved.

Here is a link that explains the whole phenoma :
http://www.morning-earth.org/Graphic-E/Interliv-Two.html#giraffes (look for the Giraffe + acacia entry)

I really think you cannot compare the way nature find ways to defends itself to preserve the ecosystem and the way nature provides plants to be eaten which have no natural defense mechanism.

 

[Beau]

But, it is not a defense mechanism to avoid being eaten, it is more of a protective measure to assure the survival of the plant itself and of the ecosystem.

I'm not sure I understand the difference. I didn't read the link you gave so maybe it is provided there but isn't a defense mechanism and a protective measure pretty much the same thing?

 

[OzRich]

I believe you're talking about the acacia, which releases tannin to avoid that the animal consume too many leaves.
But, it is not a defense mechanism to avoid being eaten, it is more of a protective measure to assure the survival of the plant itself and of the ecosystem.
This way the animal must keep moving and find an other area to keep eating so the amount of leaves never dwindles to nothing.
The balance is thus preserved.

Here is a link that explains the whole phenoma :
http://www.morning-earth.org/Graphic-E/Interliv-Two.html#giraffes (look for the Giraffe + acacia entry)

I really think you cannot compare the way nature find ways to defends itself to preserve the ecosystem and the way nature provides plants to be eaten which have no natural defense mechanism.

From the above link:

When the acacia begins its chemical defense, it releases a signal into the air, and all of the acacia trees downwind of the injured tree immediately begin to pump their own leaves full of poison too.You get a picture of a lot of hungry giraffes.

So it it defense mechanism. The point is that plants can COMMUNICATE (for whatever reason).

 

[Tigersoap]

But, it is not a defense mechanism to avoid being eaten, it is more of a protective measure to assure the survival of the plant itself and of the ecosystem.

I'm not sure I understand the difference. I didn't read the link you gave so maybe it is provided there but isn't a defense mechanism and a protective measure pretty much the same thing?

Hi Beau,

Ok Maybe I wasn't clear.
I think that distinction is that the plant has not this defense mechanism for itself alone (for its own survival alone) but for the whole ecosystem because without this, the giraffe would eat everything at the same spot, then giraffes, ants and so on that depends on the acacia to survive would die off from starvation after a while.

from the same link

This relationship is clearly not symbiosis in the traditional sense, but just as clearly it is co-evolved interliving. Although it is based in self-interest, the cooperation here is real.
Both members of this collaboration get what they need.
This giraffe/acacia pattern of interliving turns out to be a common one. It’s quite ordinary, we are beginning to discover, for plants to be responsive to animals (especially insects) in many ways.

See what I mean ? to us it might look like self-interest only (giraffe verus acacia) but there is an underlying service to others there as well that without the acacia communicating the "stop-feeding-here" chemical to the other acacias in the proximity, there would not be much acacias left, then there would not be much to eat for the giraffes who would starve and die.

It helps the acacia to regenerate and regrow leaves for the next feeding (it does not say so in the link, it's from a documentary I saw on this.).

I never said that plants cannot communicate, quite the contrary.
They communicate to protect their own kind and as a consequence protects the whole ecosystem.
Plants suffering is probably different than we think , unlike animals, plants can regrow themselves or their fruits/leaves.
This should be taken into consideration as well.

To each it's own diet but I don't agree that we should just eat like this because it's our habit of doing so and find justifications that are dubious because no matter what everyone says, the massive slaughtering of animals for profit and personal satisfaction does not make it right. Neither does intensive agriculture mind you.

The problem is still, why do we accept this psychopathic drive of the system and not others ?

 

[Z...]

But, it is not a defense mechanism to avoid being eaten, it is more of a protective measure to assure the survival of the plant itself and of the ecosystem.
This way the animal must keep moving and find an other area to keep eating so the amount of leaves never dwindles to nothing.
The balance is thus preserved.

Not so sure about the survival of the ecosystem.
Acacia tree was introduced to Maltese countryside few hundreds of years ago with devastating effect, and it has become most hated tree amongst local farmers.

Nothing will grow withing radius of several meters under acacia tree. as the result wherever you have acacia three local flora has been wiped out.
Of course we are talking about abnormal situation caused by recklessness of humans.