Talk:Aquatic

Random stuff

I found this on the article page under the stub listing, and it looks like someone's class notes. I moved it here until someone who knows plants can have a look at it. It look like they had a couple inapropriate incorrect notes...

• Endangered aquatic species survive by depending on wetlands.
• Aquatic plants are distributed around the world
• There are three types of leaves in aquatic plants: submersed leaves, floating leaves, and emersed leaves.
• Submersed leaves are thin and narrow and often highly dissected and are very flexible. They often receive low levels of sunlight because the light energy diminishes while passing though a water column.
• Floating leaves are broader leaves that are firm or leathery but flexible enough to resist tearing by wave action
• Emersed leaves such as aerial leaves are similar to typical leaves of terrestrial plants living nearby
• Some aquatic species have high ratios of surface to volume for having 1 to 2 cell layer construction
• Examples of highly dissected submersed leaves are: parrots feather and European milfoil, pondweed, thread-leaved water-nymph and rice-field water nymph, hornwort
• Examples of slightly wider but very thin submersed leaves: elodea, mare's tail
• Examples of thread-like undivided leaves: horned-pondweed, ditch-grass, quillwort, pilularia americana
• Floating leaves are broader, without major lobing and remain flat on the water, taking advantage of full sun. The upper leaf surface tends to have a very prominent cuticle therefore permitting water to roll off and not interfering with photosynthesis or growth of epiphytic algae. They have well-developed air chambers (lacunae) which provides buoyancy and have hard cells (sclereids) in the mesophyll and provide toughness for the leaf and prevents the layer from collapsing.
• Examples of floating leaves are: water lily, yellow pong-lily, cape-pondweed, pondweed, Victorian water lily, water-chestnut, floating heart, water-shield, frog-bit.
• Emersed leaves are like typical leaves of herbaceous angiosperms that inhabit full-sun environments. They are from the water and have a waxy cuticle. Many are amphistomatic and have well-developed leaf mesophyll in order to take advantage of the abundant light.
• Examples of Emersed leaves: cattails, wetland irises, buttercups, grass species, giant reed, sacred lotus, species of y yellow pond-lily, skunk cabbage, arrow leaf, knotweed, lizard's tail, yerba mansa, bur-reed, pickerelweed, thalia geniculata.
• For aquatic plants, the are rooted in the mud of muck (amphibious plant) however floating plants are not attached to the mud or bottom

J. Spencer 01:16, 24 March 2007 (UTC)