Flowers

With or without the global financial crisis hovering at our doorsteps, the show must go on.  For men, a simple way of showing the affection to your loved one is by gifting her with flowers even though I can’t imagine the close relationship between crude oil and flowers.  Just by simply presenting those colorful and fragrant ones to your sweetheart is always guaranteed to melt her heart away.

And while we are into this flowers idea, why don’t we sneak in and answer some questions about flowers and plants, for that matter, while were thinking what kind of those flowers we are going to give away.

We all know from our science classes that just like any living things, the plants need water in order to grow.  It is one of the essential elements of survival for a living thing, particularly in plants aside from sunshine.  We also have known that the plants absorb the water through their roots and it is also a well known fact that one of the major functions of the root of a plant is the absorption of water and other nutrients in order to make our plants grow and survive.  Much also is in the case of flowers.  Unlike plants that have roots, the flowers, once cut from its stem or detached from its original nature, can still blossom the way they are by absorbing water.  On a kid’s notion, it is much of a “drinking” process for a flower in order to maintain its life and its beauty as well.

Flowers “drink” water by undergoing through some quite complex but amazing processes.  The less-scientists-botanists in us would adhere to these facts that it is through terms such as transpiration, osmosis and capillary action that our lovely flower is able to “drink” and absorb water.

The whole “drinking” process would start at the very basic when the sunlight tries to express its ‘powers’ by evaporating the amount of water in a certain leaf surface thus leaving our leaves thirsty.  The water that the roots have absorbed initially will also be hijacked and evaporated.  This initial process is called transpiration.  The most crucial part of the “drinking” necessarily involves the xylem tube inside our plants.  It is that tube that connects between the roots and the stem and it is more likely that water and other nutrients pass through this tube.

Once our “thirsty” plant prompts a need to “refill” because of the transpiration process, a certain amount of vacuum is created in its xylem tube causing some sort of a suction pressure to pull a considerable amount of water that the roots once absorbed.  Water is then traveled through the xylem tube to quench our leaves and flowers.  The size of the xylem tubes are also very vital in this “drinking” process as it will enables the holding and traveling power of the water to its destination.  This process is likewise called the capillary action.  For kids alike, the whole process is much like of drinking by using a straw.  The transporting and delivery part of the water and nutrients to the stems is handled by the osmosis department.  Osmosis is the process wherein plants evenly distribute its food source on their entirety in order to survive.

Again, being awed by the process of how a flower or plant drinks water brings out another “kid” in us.  Learning and discovering these simple and amazing things makes as also more aware of the things that are happening around us that are usually neglected and not that worthy much of our attention.  They are the realities that we have to learn and embrace in a way for these simple facts are the very foundations of what we are right now.  It is a much better way of getting more aware on our environment that is in need of care nowadays.  It is in these small things that we see its great importance.  A mere “drinking” process could always go a long way if given that much attention.