I was searching through my SO disk and looking at a bunch of old files I had. I came across this report by Becky R. (our website designer). She did really well, best in class. Not bad for our only member who lives in another state (New York). Enjoy!
My Sad Attempt to Define The Plant Kingdom
By Becky Robbins
The Plant Kingdom! This is the grouping of all plants on Earth, from algae to palm trees to clinging vines to giant redwoods! The Plant Kingdom alone has twelve subdivisions. Each subdivision groups plants that are of similar qualities, yet very diverse as well.
Plants have been in our lives forever. My job as a little girl was to water the plants! We know that they were around in our parents lives, our grandparents lives, great grandparents lives, when dinosaurs lived and so on, back as far as anyone can remember. Plants have actually been around for about 510 million years. From then until about 360 million years ago, an era known as the Dovnian age, plants continued to evolve into what we know them today, 270,000 known species.
Plants are very important to the life cycle. Chlorophyll is the most important feature in a plant. Chlorophyll takes light energy, and uses it to make food (sugar, starch and other carbohydrates). Without this there would be no grains, vegetables, or fruits. There wouldn’t be any animals either, since the main source of food came from plants. This is one reason why plants are VERY important in our life. If it hadn’t been for plants, we, as a society, may not even exist!
From here, I will mention the categories that plants are divided into within the plant kingdom itself. There are 12 categories, also called phyla (phylum) and each one is important in its own right. These phyla were created based on the reproduction characteristics of plants, tissue structure, seed structure, or stature of the plants.
Anthocerophyta – Reproduce from Spores. Hornworts
Anthophyta- these plants have the seeds imbedded within the flower itself. When the flower dies, the ovary that contains the seed swells to make a fruit. Examples are fruit, Legumes and Veggies.
Bryophtya – Non-vascular plants that cannot pump fluids thru their bodies. They have to rely on the surrounding moisture to do that for them. An example is Moss. These plants reproduce from spores
Coniferophyta- reproduce by seeds inside an enclosure like a pine cone or fruit pod. An example is Conifers or pine trees.
Cycadophyta - palmlike gymnosperms (seeds not enclosed in an ovary, such as a pinecone or fruit) - examples are Cycads
Ginkgophyta – fan like with yellow fleshy seeds? (a conifer ally) Ginko
Gnetophyta – herb like, cone-bearing plants. An example would be Ephedra
Hepatophyta – Reproduce from Spores. Liverworts
Lycophyta- club mosses and related forms…..
Psilophyta – Whisk Ferns
Pterophyta- Ferns
Sphenophyta – Horsetails
I tried my best on this assignment. Please don’t hate me because biology just isn’t my thing. I can’t even pronounce any of these names…so, I don’t figure I did too bad!
Thanks for reading and hopefully laughing!
Becky Robbins
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