What plants can't reproduce without human assistance?

[Kimstu]

@Ionizer

All I did was toss crappy ears atop other stuff to rot compost-style and Nature did the rest.

The OP asked about human intervention, and for the third year in a row, corn has popped up without me doing a thing for it. I would call that pretty reliable.

Well, it sounds from your description as though you at least pulled enough shuck off the ear to determine that the seeds were “crappy”, and then tossed the ear (with exposed seeds) into a nutrient-rich environment. I think that counts as at least some human intervention.

The question is, if you tossed one of those crappy ears away in an abandoned field, would you have a patch of wild corn there a few years later? Prolly not.

[Colibri]

@Ionizer

But I stand firm that it does not require humans to grow/spread on its own.

…

I have also seen plenty of stray corn growing along canals in south/central Idaho (11+ years ago) that in no way could’ve gotten there by humans unless some person went waaaay way outta their way to plant it (?). Rarely were many stalks present as the cold weather prevented it from getting thick - I presume that killed most seed keeping it from flourishing, and lots of corn was grown commercially along those canals to provide seed to spread by whatever means.

I think the main point is that, while corn may sometimes germinate on its own, it has serious dispersal limitations. It is not going to spread out of the general area where it is being grown agriculturally; and it will not persist for very long (more than a few seasons) in areas where it is not being planted and cultivated.

[Ionizer]

@Kimstu

Well, it sounds from your description as though you at least pulled enough shuck off the ear to determine that the seeds were “crappy”, and then tossed the ear (with exposed seeds) into a nutrient-rich environment. I think that counts as at least some human intervention.

The question is, if you tossed one of those crappy ears away in an abandoned field, would you have a patch of wild corn there a few years later? Prolly not.

Nope, no husking/exposure of bad ears - I do not open up trashed ears at all since are generally too small to be of any use to my belly, so why mess with that silk? When the tip of ear is black/rotting or eaten by bugs, its outta there without further adieu. Roots emerge out top of ear or through holes in husks they find, ime. The ones this morning were all emerging from tips, fwiw. If I ever pull back husks, it is to eat whatever is there as I walk back into house. Those go into trash can by back door when I’m done and never seen again I am guessing that some corn ssp will live year-to-year better than others (field corn -v- ‘improved’ sweet corn or other similars) but have no real experience with that. Might be interesting to try it this next year, though. I really am curious about this now. I am going to try and contact someone at Oklahoma State asap to get more info on this as I find a few more hits on Google about corn’s invasiveness, and inquiring minds gotta know, ya know…

[MysteryFellow63427]

@Colibri

and [corn] will not persist for very long (more than a few seasons) in areas where it is not being planted and cultivated.

Sounds like a challenge! Who has a few acres of arable land they don’t need to do anything with for the next decade?

[Digital_is_the_new_Analog]

I used to have banana trees in my back yard. They would bear fruit once and then keel over and die. Well before they died, there would be one or two babies growing. The only thing I ever did was cut off the bananas, and usually, but not always, remove the dead tree to make room. I’m quite confident that they would have survived if I did nothing to them.

-D/a

[yabob]

@Digital_is_the_new_Analog

I used to have banana trees in my back yard. They would bear fruit once and then keel over and die. Well before they died, there would be one or two babies growing. The only thing I ever did was cut off the bananas, and usually, but not always, remove the dead tree to make room. I’m quite confident that they would have survived if I did nothing to them.

-D/a

It keels over and dies because it isn’t really a tree. The banana is actually the world’s largest herbaceous flowering plant. Shoots develop from the underground rhizome in your case, which is the same original plant. BTW, you aren’t far off calling them “babies”. Bananas have “pups”.

[SCSimmons]

@yabob

BTW, you aren’t far off calling them “babies”. Bananas have “pups”.

Hey! You’re going to make me feel bad about eating them if you keep this up!

[Digital_is_the_new_Analog]

@yabob

It keels over and dies because it isn’t really a tree. The banana is actually the world’s largest herbaceous flowering plant. Shoots develop from the underground rhizome in your case, which is the same original plant. BTW, you aren’t far off calling them “babies”. Bananas have “pups”.

I feel a little bit of ignorance falling away…

[Aspidistra]

@Kimstu

Yeah, it looks as though we need a clarification of the question in the thread title here. There are plants that literally cannot reproduce themselves without physical intervention by humans, as in the case of the seedless/grafted fruits mentioned above; and then there are plants that can physically reproduce untouched by humans, but not reliably enough to create sustainable populations, as in the case of maize/corn.

It’s my daughter’s question originally (we were discussing bananas, and how all the bananas we eat are actually clones of each other), and I think “any way that would lead to an interesting discussion” is probably a good clarification of it.

So probably “anything seedless” would be a good contender. But then again, I know strawberries, though they have seeds, don’t need them to make another strawberry plant - just send down some suckers. Can, say, seedless grapes do that too?

I had thought of corn, because I knew it had been greatly bred away from the original wild plant, but wasn’t sure. (I guess the verdict at the moment is ‘still not sure’ - depends how you define it)

[Colibri]

@Aspidistra

So probably “anything seedless” would be a good contender. But then again, I know strawberries, though they have seeds, don’t need them to make another strawberry plant - just send down some suckers. Can, say, seedless grapes do that too?

Grapes can propagate themselves by sending up sucker shoots from the roots. Many plants can reproduce asexually by sending out runners or producing sucker shoots. The resulting offspring are clones, genetically identical to the parent plant. So if you include this mode of reproduction, there would be few if any plants that absolutely can’t reproduce without the aid of humans.

I had thought of corn, because I knew it had been greatly bred away from the original wild plant, but wasn’t sure. (I guess the verdict at the moment is ‘still not sure’ - depends how you define it)

Corn produces fertile seeds, which can germinate and grow into adult plants on their own. It just doesn’t disperse well enough to maintain a viable population in the wild for any length of time.

[Deadpool2k]

All are able to reproduce by themself cus if you analyze once they did it before human learn how to manipulate them

[Kimstu]

@Deadpool2k

All are able to reproduce by themself cus if you analyze once they did it before human learn how to manipulate them

But the point is that nowadays, human beings have “manipulated” some plants with years or centuries of selective breeding to the point where they can’t any longer reproduce by themselves.

Just because the wild ancestors of all modern plants were fully self-reliant doesn’t mean that all their pampered cultivated descendants today could still make it on their own. They’ve evolved into a culture of dependency, so to speak.