Plants Can Hear Themselves Being Eaten, and Can Communicate the Threat
FULL ARTICLE (recommended)
How Plants Communicate
As mentioned earlier, plants also communicate with other plants—even with plants of other species—through a complex underground network that includes:
- The plants' rhizosphere (root ball)
- Aerial emissions (volatile gasses emitted by the plants)
- Mycelial networks in the soil
These three systems work together forming a "plant internet," if you will, where information about each plant's status is constantly exchanged. One of the organisms responsible for this amazing biochemical highway is a type of fungus called mycorrhizae.
The name mycorrhiza literally means fungus root.
4 These fungi form a symbiotic relationship with the plant, colonizing the roots and sending extremely fine filaments far out into the soil that act as root extensions
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Not only do these networks sound the alarm about invaders, but the filaments are more effective in nutrient and water absorption than the plant roots themselves—mycorrhizae increase the nutrient absorption of the plant 100 to 1,000 times.
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In one thimbleful of healthy soil, you can find several MILES of fungal filaments, all releasing powerful enzymes that help dissolve tightly bound soil nutrients, such as organic nitrogen, phosphorus, and iron.
This is one of the major reasons why tilling the soil is deleterious to gardening or farming as it damages these fragile fungal filaments. The last thing any gardener or farmer should be doing is tilling the soil.
That is one of the reasons why wood chips are so useful as they not only eliminate tilling but effectively feeds the fungi. One of the best things you can do for your garden is to put a four inch layer of wood chips (not bark) around your plants to encourage this fungal growth and attract earthworms so they can create vermicompost.
Peace!
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