Tf are the other trees going to do with this information? Run away?
This tree looks to increase the toxicity of its leaves to deter giraffe.
They can send a chemical that will make their leaves taste bad.
Wait until you get to mycelium networks, that's a life-long rabbit hole
The secret glue that holds all life together
When I was at the psychiatrist's to see about getting diagnosed I was asked how it was affecting my everyday life and somehow I ended up talking about the migration patterns of Romanian shepherds
I can see how you got there. Not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing but what I do know is that bees communicate by dancing.
*Acacia trees.
Sometimes I emit clouds of methane gas just to fuck with people.
Sometimes I emit clouds of methane because God dammit, I'm not just going to cut ice cream out of my life!
I'm in this comment and it hurts real bad.
brb gonna go into the woods with an ethylene tank and do some trolling
Ok, this is sending me off into a Skies of Arcadia rabbit hole. Who is coming with me?
(Note to self: do not dig out the Dreamcast when I get home tonight, because I definitely know where the SoA disc is)
I honestly like the added content of the GameCube version. It's got some bounty hunting type missions against pirates and the power ups to cupil are now found hidden through the game world instead of grinding the save card game on Dreamcast
Of all the games to remake, boy would I love the Skies of Arcadia remake of the GameCube version. ;_;
TF is an Arcadia tree?
*Acacia
How do you guys retain memory of what you looked into for long enough that you can post about it?
I just cannot infodump like this, I wish I could.
But ethylene is the ripening signal molecule, right? Why would trees be warning other trees to ripen their fruit?
I looked it up, and it also increases the tannin levels in the leaves. So if something is eating the tree, it and other nearby trees change their leaves to become more toxic to what usually eats them.
I'm guessing this leaves them generally non-toxic which helps keep critters they don't mind around.
Makes sense. If animals are about to start eating, they'll want the fruit to be ready. Obviously the seeds need to be ready, but also the flavour of the fruits themselves so animals don't ignore them and they all end up rotting directly below their parent.
Or, from another angle, one tree that doesn't want animals eating it emits chemical that causes fruit of other trees to be more attractive so animals are less likely to waste time eating the comparatively less nutritious leaves or bark.
And adding a layer to that, even if the animals that like to eat its bark/leaves aren't interested in the fruit, if other animals are attracted to the fruit, it can attract more predators that might be happy to eat animals looking for bark/leaves as well as those looking for fruit. And both predators and prey might also be directly attracted to the original chemical the tree released.
Or it might just be a coincidence. Actually, even if it is functional in those ways or others, it's still a coincidence because that's how evolution works, it just stuck around either because it works or because it's tied to some other trait that does with and doesn't cost enough to be a net negative.
Note: this is all speculation, not based on any specific knowledge about this tree or ecosystem.
I love those.
That's how I learnt QCD before High School
