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Read Ebook: How Does a Tree Grow? Or Botany for Young Australians by Bonwick James
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Ebook has 332 lines and 13351 words, and 7 pages
Will no part mix with the water?
There will be something; for if we pour off the water, and allow it to evaporate in a dish, there will be found to be a sediment left, and that is potash or pearl ash.
I have heard of people in the bush doing that when they could not get soap, for they said that the potash got the dirt out of clothes.
It is a great pity that we in these colonies burn away so much wood in waste when clearing land, Willie, without thinking of making potash out of the ashes, for it fetches a good price.
Then there is potash in the plant. Has any thing else been found in the ash beside that and carbon?
Yes, my lad. Sulphur or brimstone, lime, soda, flint, ammonia, phosphorus, magnesia, and iron, are contained in trees.
But how could all these things get there?
Why, if we cannot find them in the air to be absorbed by the leaves, they must be in the soil or ground. Now, it so happens that those substances are to be found in different quantities in different places.
How do they get into the plant, father?
Simply by the little rootlets absorbing small particles of them, mixed with moisture.
But do all plants require the same amount of lime, potash, soda, and the others?
No, my dear. There are not two sorts of trees that feed upon the same materials in exactly the same proportions.
Is that the reason, then, why some land is so much better fitted to grow one plant than another?
The reason is, because the one soil has more of the right sort of food in it.
Now I see that if I wanted to grow a good crop of any thing, I must give it plenty of the food it likes best.
Yes, but not too much. For like as too much nice rich food is bad for children, so it is with vegetables: ground may be too rich, as well as too poor.
I have heard people say that it is not wise to grow the same thing in the same soil year after year: why is this?
Because it would gradually consume all the food there, and then it would starve, and look miserable.
Then my beautiful flower-bed will by-and-by cease to bring forth such a fine show as it has done this season.
Of course it will, unless you provide your plants with fresh food.
Fresh food, father; I do not understand you.
I mean, manure must be mixed with the soil.
How is manure food for plants?
Because it contains the materials they require. You throw wood ashes over the ground, and so add sulphur, potash, and carbon. Sea weed manure furnishes plenty of soda. Bone dust contains lime and phosphorus.
It is possible, then, to apply to the ground the amount of solid matter taken out of it by the plant, so that if my radish bed had some manure, it would be as good as it was before my crop came off.
That is perfectly correct, my boy.
But how is it that a gum-tree forest is kept up, for there must be a tremendous lot of lime, soda, flint, and the rest, removed from the soil?
Yes, but when the trees fall, they rot, and the solid parts return to the ground.
Oh, father, the remains are very small, compared to the living tree.
True, because the principal part of a plant consists of the gases, which fly off, and of carbon, which unites with the oxygen of the air.
How does God bring fresh carbon to the forest?
Several ways: smoke is one source, and the breath of animals another.
What has the breath to do with it?
Every time you respire, or breathe out, some carbonic acid comes out with air, and is carried into the atmosphere.
Why, father, you do not mean to say that my breath helps to make cabbages grow.
The carbon passing from your body may become a part of a cabbage, or gum tree, or a delicate tulip.
The next time Willie and his father were out together, the conversation again fell upon trees. The wonder of the boy had been strongly excited by the last lesson, and he had now lots of questions to ask. He knew enough to know that there must be a great deal more to learn. He had been told that trees fed the same as animals, and he felt sure that inside there must be some entrances for the food to reach parts needing supply. Then he sought to understand how the growing process was managed, and especially how seeds were formed, and how the plant sprang from them. Thus, question after question poured out from the boy's lips, without even a pause for a reply.
"Stop, stop, my man," said his father; "I am not like the Hindoo god with half-a-dozen pairs of ears, and half-a-dozen tongues. We will go now a little deeper into the subject; but we must take one thing at a time. What do you think of that gum tree yonder?
That is a noble fellow. What a barrel he has got for splitting paling out of! And hasn't he got a fine top knot? Why, that must be almost as big as that Tasmanian tree you read about.
Oh, no; that one was 350 feet high, and was 104 feet round; while this is not above 100 feet high, and 30 round.
Well, then, that must be a monster surely. How curious to think it was once a tiny little thing that I could pull up with my finger! I say, father, how many cartloads of carbon this one must have got hold of! I fancy it has got gas enough to fill many a balloon. But how did it grow?
To answer that question, will give us some trouble, and take some time. First, tell me all the parts of the tree.
What I cannot see is the root; then comes the stem, then the branches, and then the leaves.
You forget the flower.
Flower! whoever heard tell of a gum flower? How funny the word sounds!
If there be no flower, how are you to get the seed?
I never thought of that. But flowers are always such pretty light things, that one would be sure to see them a long way off on a gum tree.
But if instead of having fine red leaves, my lad, the flower had none, and the other part was much the same colour as the leaves, do you think you would notice it so readily?
No, father. Won't I give a good look out for it after this; for I am sure none of our boys at school ever talk of gum flowers, though we often go to gather wattle blossoms.
To go on with our tree--we will take the root, and there is a Stringy Bark blown over in the last storm.
And a strong root it has, too. How the wind must have puffed to overcome the weight of all the gravel and clay resting on that lot of roots, especially as they held the gravel like so many fingers. So these are the suckers of moisture and food out of the soil.
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