Quote:
Originally Posted by alatar
My professor, long suffering, countered my enthusiasm as he knew that I hadn't considered the energy requirements. Even if it were possible to have a shrub glow, how much ATP would it take to keep the thing going - scientists can be such killjoys. Trees, like a maple, produce a sweet sap that can end up on flapjakes, and so my counter counter was that if these trees could go on living after being tapped to make my breakfast syrup, then surely they could glow if we left them their sap. . . . and my professor always started to worry when I was outlining my plan for designing large carnivorous glowing trees (formerly I had a similar plan to get them walking, but that too required too much energy). 
Anyway, while I dreamed away of one day seeing a glowing tree, nature was working on its own version, which, demonstrating that hobbits do rule, ended up being, of all things, a mushroom. |
Having recently had the sad misfortune to watch a 125 year old oak felled because of structural damage in a storm, I can say that roots are integral to a fully functioning tree. In fact, even once the trunk was sawn off, the stump persisted in pumping up/out sap/water for the now-nonexistent tree.
Which raises an interesting point about ents. If roots are the 'heart' of a tree, pumping the essential life fluid through all the limbs, what fulfils that function in ents? Or are their feet hairy, like hobbit feet, but hairy with roots, which can immediately dig down into the earth once an ent stops walking? Or have ents developed a sort of secondary heart where their limbs meet at the trunk, which ensures the free flow of sap? I recall some dinosaurs actually had second brains to control the movement of their tail...