plant parts
Level 1 (Easy): What part of the plant grows underground and drinks water from the soil?
Roots
Level 1 (Easy): What do many trees drop in the autumn when the weather gets cold?
Leaves
Level 1 (Easy): Which desert plant has sharp spines instead of soft leaves?
Cactus
Level 1 (Easy): What bright object in the sky gives plants the energy they need to grow?
Answer: The Sun
Level 1 (Easy): Is a tomato scientifically a fruit or a vegetable?
Answer: Fruit (because it has seeds!)
Level 2 (Medium): What part of the plant acts like a straw to carry water up to the leaves?
Stem
Level 2 (Medium): What protective outer layer acts like "skin" for a tree trunk?
Bark
Level 2 (Medium): Which bug-eating plant snaps shut when an insect touches its tiny hairs?
Venus Flytrap
Level 2 (Medium): What green chemical inside leaves catches sunlight?
Chlorophyll
Level 2 (Medium): What fast-growing giant grass can grow over three feet in just one day?
Bamboo
Level 3 (Hard): What is the sticky powder inside flowers that bees carry to help plants make seeds?
Pollen
Level 3 (Hard): What do we call trees that keep their leaves green all winter long?
Answer: Evergreens (or Conifers)
Level 3 (Hard): What giant flower attracts flies by smelling like rotting, smelly trash?
Answer: Corpse Flower (or Rafflesia)
Level 3 (Hard): What is the big science word for how plants turn sunlight into food?
Answer: Photosynthesis
Level 3 (Hard): Mushrooms look like plants, but what kingdom of living things do they actually belong to?
Fungi
Level 4 (Very Hard): What are the tiny microscopic mouths on a leaf that let the plant breathe air?
Stomata
Level 4 (Very Hard): What is the tallest species of tree in the world?
Answer: Coast Redwood
Level 4 (Very Hard): What type of plant doesn't need soil and absorbs water right out of the air?
Answer: Air Plant (or Tillandsia)
Level 4 (Very Hard): What gas do humans breathe out that plants breathe in?
Carbon Dioxide
Level 4 (Very Hard): What massive floating water plant has lily pads so strong a small dog could sit on them?
Answer: Giant Water Lily (Victoria amazonica)
Level 5 (Impossible): What specialized tissue inside a stem acts like tiny pipes to carry water up from roots?
Answer: Xylem (ZY-lum)
Level 5 (Impossible): What is the scientific name for counting tree rings to figure out how old a tree is?
Dendrochronology
Level 5 (Impossible): Which African desert plant can live for over 1,000 years using only two giant leaves that never stop growing?
Answer: Welwitschia (wel-WITCH-ee-uh)
Level 5 (Impossible): What type of sugar molecule do plants create during photosynthesis to feed themselves?
Glucose
Level 5 (Impossible): What single underground plant colony made of thousands of connected tree trunks is considered one of the heaviest living things on Earth?
Answer: Pando (a colony of Quaking Aspen trees)