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Prickles on a blackberry branch. In plant morphology, thorns, spines, and prickles, and in general spinose structures (sometimes called spinose teeth or spinose apical processes), are hard, rigid extensions or modifications of leaves, roots, stems, or buds with sharp, stiff ends, and generally serve the same function: physically defending plants against herbivory.
In many cases, spines are a defense mechanism that help protect the animal against potential predators. Because spines are sharp, they can puncture skin and inflict pain and damage which may cause the predator to avoid that species from that point on. The spine of some animals are capable of injecting venom. In the case of some large species of ...
Some plants have physical defenses such as thorns, spines and prickles, but by far the most common type of protection is chemical. [ 1 ] Over millennia, through the process of natural selection , plants have evolved the means to produce a vast and complicated array of chemical compounds to deter herbivores.
Prickles and thorns are an evolved defense against herbivores — animals that eat plants — and can also aid in growth, plant competition and water retention, according to the study.
Viburnum lesquereuxii leaf with insect damage; Dakota Sandstone (Cretaceous) of Ellsworth County, Kansas. Scale bar is 10 mm. Knowledge of herbivory in geological time comes from three sources: fossilized plants, which may preserve evidence of defense (such as spines) or herbivory-related damage; the observation of plant debris in fossilised animal feces; and the structure of herbivore mouthparts.
The hooks or teeth generally cause irritation, and some species commonly cause gross injury to animals, or expensive damage to clothing or to vehicle tires. [citation needed] Burs serve the plants that bear them in two main ways. Firstly, burs are spinescent and tend to repel some herbivores, much as other spines and prickles do. [3]
The spines are the relatively large, radiating organs; the glochids are the fine prickles in the centres of the bunches. Glochids (Opuntia microdasys monstrose) Glochids or glochidia (sg.: "glochidium") are hair-like spines or short prickles, generally barbed, found on the areoles of cacti in the sub-family Opuntioideae.
No, this isn't an article written for (or by) squirrels – humans can actually eat acorns under certain circumstances. The nuts stem from oak trees, and can actually elicit a mild, nutty flavor.