Bird of paradise is actually not a bird at all - it's a flower from the family called strelitizia. With its gorgeous, blue-tongued, orange flowers, it does indeed look like a long-necked tropical bird. This flower actually 'wants' to look like a bird as it 'wants' to attract birds. Its main pollinators are birds. Since plants can't move around and look for a mate to reproduce, many have evolved elaborate mechanisms of pollination — often cheating pollinators into doing the work for them. The focal point of these efforts is the flower. Flowers attract pollinators and then use the opportunity to distribute or gather pollen via the pollinator. Bird of paradise clearly looks like a bird and attracts its pollinators very well. The weight of the bird when standing on the spathe opens the flower to release the pollen onto the bird's feet, which is then deposited on the next flower it visits. That's how bird of paradise reproduces. Nature is very clever dear Atria, don't you think so? |
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Farshid Shenassa
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April 2020
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