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The patterns of seed dispersal are determined in large part by the specific 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.
Epilobium hirsutum seed head dispersing seeds. In spermatophyte plants, seed dispersal is the movement, spread or transport of seeds away from the parent plant. [1] 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 vectors such as birds.
Thus, the foxtail is a type of diaspore or plant dispersal unit. Some grasses that produce a foxtail are themselves called "foxtail", also " spear grass ". They can become a health hazard for dogs , cats , and other domestic animals, [ 1 ] and a nuisance for people.
Secondly, plants with burs rely largely on living agents to disperse their seeds; their burs are mechanisms of seed dispersal by epizoochory (dispersal by attaching to the outside of animals). [5] Spinescent plants repel herbivores mechanically by wounding the herbivore's mouth or digestive system.
The seeds are fleshy, short-lived, and germinate rapidly where they land. Being poisonous and distasteful, they are not attractive to candidate transport animals, so the rolling diaspore is a very effective dispersal strategy for such plants. Genera with this means of seed dispersal include Ammocharis, Boophone, Crossyne and Brunsvigia. [17]
In botany, a diaspore is a plant dispersal unit consisting of a seed or spore plus any additional tissues that assist dispersal. In some flowering plants, the diaspore is a seed and fruit together, or a seed and elaiosome. In a few plants, the diaspore is most or all of the plant, and is known as a tumbleweed.
These patterns of ant dispersal are predictable enough to permit plants to manipulate animal behaviour and influence seed fate, [13] effectively directing the dispersal of seeds to desirable sites. For example, myrmecochores can influence seed fate by producing rounder, smoother diaspores that inhibit ants from redispersing seeds after ...
Wind dispersal of dandelion fruits. Plants can be said to migrate, as seed dispersal enables plants to grow in new areas, under environmental constraints such as temperature and rainfall. When those constraints change, the border of a plant species's distribution may move, so the plant may be said to migrate, as for example in forest migration ...