Tension wood: A 'muscle' that can both bend and straighten plants

Posted by mdp2021 5 days ago

Comments

Comment by culi 2 hours ago

Trees "calculate" which branches to drop based on data they gather as they grow. A competent and experienced arborist knows how to read the tree and simply safely cut off the branches that the tree was already intending to drop so that it doesn't fall on your house or whatever. Inexperienced arborists often ignore this key dendrology fact and may totally butcher your tree. In the process they can create an even larger risk of a tree falling over onto your house during a storm

It's called cladoptosis (basically self-pruning) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cladoptosis

EDIT: since I'm on the topic of bad tree trimming, NEVER TOP YOUR TREES https://www.arborday.org/tree-resources/dont-top-trees

Comment by argimenes 22 minutes ago

Fascinating! Where is this data stored? I love the idea of a Tree DB queried via TreeSQL.

Comment by vlyan 1 hour ago

>NEVER TOP YOUR TREES

they do it where I live because the branches bang against apartments' windows when it's windy. I don't think there's another low-maintenance solution.

Comment by culi 1 hour ago

Coppicing or pollarding are both well-historied techniques that can be used to keep trees growing short. They differ significantly from topping and require a lot of expertise. They also have to be started when the tree is young

Comment by mightysashiman 22 minutes ago

I'd like to grow bonzai. I have zero prior knowledge. I suppose what you mention applies. Would you happen to have any good resource that applies to bonzai science please?

Comment by 1 hour ago

Comment by zekefoppa 2 hours ago

Imo the title here buries the lede: we've known that trees form tension wood in response to external stress. This study claims to find that trees will form it in response only to their own curvature, independent of external factors even including gravity. They compare it to proprioception. That's neat!

Comment by N_Lens 2 hours ago

I thought ‘interoception’ might also be appropriate in this context.

Comment by N_Lens 2 hours ago

Let me take this opportunity to remind HN readers - Posture & Hydration Check!

Comment by emerongi 2 hours ago

Or: drink when you feel thirsty and change your position when your back gets tired.

Comment by culi 1 hour ago

Yes, the science has moved to "drink when you're thirsty" a long time ago and it's annoying how many people believe drinking 3 liters of water per day is a key tenant of human health.

(most of) Our bodies are quite good at telling us when we should drink more water. You should never be forcing yourself to drink

https://newsnetwork.mayoclinic.org/discussion/mayo-clinic-mi...

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/313389

All that being said, I'm not sure GP was necessarily endorsing the idea that you should drink a certain amount of water a day. I read it as a suggestion to pull away from the screen and listen to your body

Comment by dyauspitr 1 hour ago

But why? unless it’s a copious amount of water like a gallon or more in an hour or two or something insane like that what is the problem with drinking water? I would assume it would just have positive effects.

Comment by culi 1 hour ago

> "You can become dehydrated if you take in too little. And you can actually cause problems, such as exercise-induced low sodium or hyponatremia, if you take in too much," says Dr. Sara Filmalter, a Mayo Clinic family physician. "So the general rule of thumb at this point among physicians is to drink to thirst."

Comment by Zarathustra30 1 hour ago

Some folks' interrupts are buggy, so they resort to polling.

Comment by layla5alive 1 hour ago

ADHD hyperfocus disables most interrupts.. very task efficient, at the expense of all else :/