when two plants love each other very much

I know I’m not the only one who is sneezing with an itchy face and eyes this week. Cars are turning yellow and you literally have to windshield-wipe off the pollen in order to drive. But even though we are all covered in plant sperm, we can still appreciate the miracle of pollination with the onset of spring.

Male cones on the left, female on the right (emhsbot-zoo.wikispaces.com)

With exceptions here and there, there are no such things as “girl plants” and “boy plants.” Let’s take a pine tree for example (they’re the main culprits to blame for your car right now, FYI): a single pine tree has both male and female structures. The pinecone is the female structure, and the little yellow dangly things are the male structures. The yellow dangly things release the pollen, and the cones receive. And lots of plants have what you could consider an allergy to their own pollen so that they cannot self-fertilize. This way, pine trees swap pollen with each other to increase genetic diversity and have healthier baby pine trees. In this case, wind is the main vector by which trees swap pollen.

Insects are also vectors for pollination. A bee, for example, might land on a daisy. As it sticks its face down into the flower to lick out nectar, pollen gets stuck on its little legs and underbelly. Then it flies to the next flower and sticks its face into it, all the while pollen from the previous flower getting all over this one. Without even realizing it, the bee has brought pollen from one flower to another. Clueless little flower-sex-enabling insect.

Looks like a bee! (fs.fed.us)

Oh but don’t worry, there are even more clueless insects than these daisy-pollinating bees. Orchids, an especially dazzling group of flowering plants, have evolved some unique pollination adaptations that take advantage of their insect pollinators. Some of them, to put it simply, look like an insect in order to trick a member of that insect species to try and mate with it. The unsuspecting bug will enthusiastically rub its little insect self all up ON that orchid, becoming covered in pollen. Once the bee realizes that it’s trying to have sex with a flower and it checks to make sure its friends didn’t see, it flies off to the next orchid and does it all over again. What’s a bug gotta do for some same-species lovin around here?!

Looks like a wasp (whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com)

It’s important to remember that this mechanism is the result of evolution, and not cognitive trickery on the part of the orchid (it’s a plant). Nonetheless, the resulting flowers are astounding.

SUCKER! (eyesseetheworldspinninground.blogspot)

Happy spring break, all.