The coastal California's redwood forests, with their lush fern, towering trees and damp petrichor scent, do face dry summers. In order to survive, the trees grow shoots with leaves that absorb air.
Many plants drink through their leaves, but no one has figured out how the water gets in there. Even a thin film of water can block the flow of carbon dioxide into leaf openings, making it difficult to make food.
Chin and her colleagues climbed the trees in different climates to see how they solved the problem. They measured the amount of water absorbed by the leafy shoots in the lab. They looked at leaf surfaces and cross sections to see which traits affect the amount of water in the air.
Their analysis was published in a journal. Asparagus stalks with leaves bunched close to a twig make up a small portion of the canopy but absorb water at four times the rate of ordinary-lookingpheral shoots. After getting wet, a tall redwood can absorb up to 13 gallons of water. The peripheral leaves are water resistant.
The study found that redwoods in the south pull more water from summer fog and light rain than their northern counterparts. pines, for example, have two types that are similar to the ones on redwoods. In the context of climate change,Versatility could be important. The ability to subsidize your water source with water from the air becomes more important in a dry world.
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