Botany; Geotropism; Plants -- Irritability and movements
Fig. 79. Azalea Indica: circumnutation of stem, illuminated from above,
traced on horizontal glass, from 9.30 A.M. March 9th to 12.10 P.M. on
the 10th. But on the morning of the 10th only four dots were made
between 8.30 A.M. and 12.10 P.M., both hours included, so that the
circumnutation is not fairly represented in this part of the diagram.
Movement of the bead here magnified about 30 times.
Fig. 80. Plumbago Capensis: circumnutation of tip of a lateral branch,
traced on horizontal glass, from 7.20 P.M. on March 7th to 3 P.M. on
the 9th. Movement of bead magnified 13 times. Plant feebly illuminated
from above.
(15.) Aloysia citriodora (Verbenaceae, Fam. 173).—The following figure
(Fig. 81) gives the movements of a shoot during
31 h. 40 m., and shows that it circumnutated. The bush was 15 inches in
height.
Fig. 81. Aloysia citriodora: circumnutation of stem, traced from 8.20
A.M. on March 22nd to 4 P.M. on 23rd. Plant kept in darkness. Movement
magnified about 40 times.
(16.) Verbena melindres (?) (a scarlet-flowered herbaceous var.)
(Verbenaceae).—A shoot 8 inches in height had been laid horizontally,
for the sake of observing its apogeotropism, and the terminal portion
had grown vertically upwards for a length of 1½ inch. A glass filament,
with a bead at the end, was fixed upright to the tip, and its movements
were traced during 41 h. 30 m. on a vertical glass (Fig. 82). Under
these circumstances the lateral movements were chiefly shown; but as
the lines from side to side are not on the same level, the shoot
must have moved in a plane at right angles to that of the lateral
movement, that is, it must have circumnutated. On the next day (6th)
the shoot moved in the course of 16 h. four times to the right, and
four times to the left; and this apparently represents the formation of
four ellipses, so that each was completed in 4 h. (17.) Ceratophyllum
demersum (Ceratophylleae, Fam. 220).—An interesting account of the
movements of the stem of this water-plant has been published by M. E.
Rodier.[1] The movements are confined to the young internodes, becoming
less and less lower down the stem; and they are extraordinary from
their amplitude. The stems sometimes moved through an angle of above
200° in 6 h., and in one instance through 220° in 3 h. They generally
bent from right to left in the morning, and in an opposite direction in
the afternoon; but the movement was sometimes temporarily reversed or
quite arrested. It was not affected by light. It does not appear that
M. Rodier made any diagram on a horizontal plane representing the
actual course pursued by the apex, but he speaks of the “branches
executing round their axes of growth a movement of torsion.” From the
particulars above given, and remembering in the case of twining plants
and of tendrils, how difficult it is not to mistake their bending to
all points of the compass for true torsion, we are led to believe that
the stems of this Ceratophyllum circumnutate, probably in the shape of
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