Characteristics
What are the characteristics of plants?
Plants are multi-cellular (eukaryotes)
Two stage life (sporophyte & gametophyte)
They have cell walls and vacuoles
They make their own food
What are the two main groups of plants?
Vascular & Non-vascular
Describe Mosses
Moss grows on moist soil an rocks. It has leafy stalks and rhizoid (A nonvascular rootlike structure that helps mosses attach themselves to surfaces such as rocks and trees)
Describe characteristics of Seed plants
They are vascular plants that reproduce by making seeds. There are two different main groups Gymnosperms and Angiosperms
What are tropisms and give examples
Tropism is a plants growth reaction to a stimulus. The best example is when a plant turns the other way to face the sun like a sunflower.
How do plants make food?
Plants make their food using photosynthesis, and chlorophyll
Describe Vascular Plants
Vascular plants have a system of tube-like tissues that transports water nutrients and other minerals from one part of the plant to another part.
Roots stems and leaves are the three main organs in Vascular plants.
Describe Liverworts
Liverworts can be leafy and moss like broad or flattened, the come in many different shapes. There are more than 8,000 species. You can find them near rivers or on rocks.
What are Gymnosperms
They produce seeds and are not enclosed in a fruit
Ex- Cycads, Ginkgoes, and Conifers
Many have needle like leaves and a deep growing root system
What are stomata and why are they important?
Stomata helps plants exchange gases and respond to its water levels. Each stoma has two guard cells that open & close the stomata. When it is open carbon dioxide enters the leaf and oxygen and water vapor exit the leaf. It is important because when a plant is wilting the stomata closes preventing further water loss.
Are plants producers, comsumers, or decomposers?
Plants are producers
Describe Non-vascular Plants
Non-vascular plants do not have this system of tubes- Instead water must move from the environment and throughout the plant by a process called diffusion.
Ex- Mosses, Liverworts, and hornworts.
Describe Hornworts
Fewer than 100 species of Hornworts. If you look closely at a Hornwort you can see curved structures that look like horns growing out of the gametophytesUsually live in the soil mixed in with different grass plants.
What are the differences between monocots and dicots?
Monocots- Has parallel veins on leaves, flower parts come in pairs or multiples of 3, fibrous root system
Dicots- Has branching veins, flower parts come in fours or fives
What is dormancy? What causes it?
Dormancy is basically when plants hibernate. It is triggered by shorter days and longer nights that start in the fall that help trigger winter dormancy.
What are the two stages in a plant's life cycle?
Plants have a gametophyte and sporophyte stage
How do you tell if a plant is non-vascular?
All non-vascular plants are small since if they were large the cells of the plants that are far from the ground wouldn’t get enough water.
Describe Ferns
Ferns have roots and most have rhizoids that help them spread Ferns have leaves called fronds, fronds un-curl as the plants grow
What is pollination?
Pollination happens when pollen lands on the female plant reproductive structure and fertilizes the egg. The fertilized egg develops into an embryo and the ovule becomes the seed, animals or birds, bees, and bat can help in the process
Describe Cycads – sago palm
Today they grow mostly in tropical and subtropical areas. They look like palm trees with cones. They can grow to become as large as a foot ball
Describe the gametophyte and the sporophyte stages for plants
These are the two stages in which plants reproduce and spread to new areas.
In the sporophyte stages plants make spores that are genetically identical to the parent plant. In the right environment spores can grow into new plants that are called gametophytes.
In the gametophyte stage, plants produce gametes.
How are seedless non-vascular plants classified? What makes them different from other plants?
All non-vascular plants and even some vascular plants are seedless, those plants reproduce using spores.
Describe Horsetails
Have cane like stems w/ leaves that grow in a unique whorl pattern around the stems. Usually grow in wet marshy places
Stems are hollow and contain silica
The silica gives horsetails a gritty rough texture
How do plants obtain and use energy?
Plants will capture light energy in their Chloroplast, then they will use their chloroplasts to use light energy to make sugar. Then mitochondria release energy from the sugar.
Describe Ginkgoes
Millions of yrs. ago there were many species but today only one exists