Alsomitra Vine Seed Gliders!
Posted: December 3rd, 2009 | Author: W | Filed under: Birds, Video, Vines | No Comments »Wow. Once again file under “severe nature magic”. This BBC video link is a must-watch.
I sadly wasn’t able to find much more information in English about this amazing vine, but a Google Translation of the Spanish Wikipedia page seems to indicate that it is a type of cucumber in the Cucurbitaceae family and thus related to melons, gourds and, well, other cucumbers.
The seeds, which are produced by a football-sized pod, can glide hundreds of metres across the forest. That ensures that the seeds fall far from their parent, giving the next generation of vines a head start. A BBC team team captured the film of the gliding seeds for the natural history series Life.
