Solo The Science of Plants III

[Kaidan Arianos]

Timestamp: 30th of Fall, 512 A.V. Such a beautiful flower, thought Kaidan, as he looked up towards the professor's desk, gazing intently upon the Orchids that happened to be situated directly atop his desk. I wish I could grow those, he thought, but then his thoughts drifted elsewhere, to Zip, a younger man that he had met only about ten days ago, and had developed feelings for over the short course of their knowing each other. He thought about the blond hair that he could push back behind Zip's ears, and out of his face, so that he could get a clearer view of his face, that perfect face, so much like... "KAIDAN!" shouted the professor at him. "Huh?!" said Kaidan whose eyes immediately darted towards the professor. "I was asking you a question!" the professor exclaimed. "But you seem to have been distracted and off in your own world. Get back on Mizahar, now!" Kaidan blushed, and nodded, his eyes looking down towards his notes briefly, and then back up towards the professor. All eyes in the class were once again glued upon him. "What... er... what was the question?" he asked, hoping the professor would repeat himself, so that Kaidan could answer it, and not look like a complete fool. "I was simply asking if you could identify the plants that are situated upon my desk!" the professor said, obviously unhappy at having to repeat himself, but Kaidan nodded, and said, "I'm not sure which species they are, but they are of the Orchid family... there are too many species of those around to actually count them all... I guess, especially after the Valterrean, when most of our botanical data on them was lost..." He was assuming the botanical data was lost, much like the trumpet pitcher plants they had gone over in a previous class period. The professor nodded, his frown still apparent upon his face. "Decent enough answer, now, my teaching aids will get you all an orchid plant for you to dissect, and we shall learn the various parts of the orchid, in depth, as well as their environment that they live in, in depth..." he said. And with that, the professor's teaching aides departed and began to bring in a bunch of white orchid plants for everyone to have at least one, and be able to dissect. "Now as usual, be careful, these plants were recently transplanted from a field outside of Zeltiva, so they are fairly delicate. If you screw up the dissection, then you obviously won't get any points for the class today," the professor gave out his usual warning before they began on their dissections. "First a little bit of background information on the orchids. They can be found almost anywhere in Mizahar. And there are way too many species to count as Kaidan had already specified," the professor stated, giving Kaidan a sidelong glance as he spoke to the rest of the classroom. "For our dissection today, we will start by looking at the flower, and working our way down to the roots," the professor then continued. "If you look at the flowers, I want you to draw a picture of them, on your papers. Try to make it as exact as possible. I know we are not all artists in this classroom, but drawing what you see can't be that difficult. And the more you do it, the better you'll get at it," he said. Kaidan took the time to start drawing the orchid upon a sheet of paper, starting with the flower, he'd draw the curvature within the petals, working his way inwards to the sepal, stigmata, and anthers. Once he had finished his crude drawing of the orchid that was situated directly in front of him, he looked back up towards the teacher, eyes scanning the classroom to see how many others had finished with it. "Now, we shall label the parts of the flower. Can anyone point out where the corolla is? We should all know what this is as we've gone over it quite a bit in class, it is possibly the easiest portion and most visible portion of the flower," said the professor. Kaidan raised his hand, and when called on said, "The corolla happens to be the circle of petals that one can see on the flower. It is all of the petals combined..." The professor nodded, in agreement with Kaidan, and then continued on to speak about another portion of the flower. "Now, the flowers of orchids can grow in a variety of ways. Can anyone take a stab at how these orchids are growing? Try to utilize some of the terminology we've spoken of in previous classes..." he stated. Kaidan began his examination of the flower to try and decipher how exactly it grew that differed from other orchids he had seen. It took him a bit of time, but he finally noticed it. The stem seemed to be apical. This mean that it would grow from the apex of the stem. Slowly looking up, it seemed that somebody else had already answered the question for the class, and Kaidan had missed it by not paying attention. That was okay though, he knew that it grew from the apex of the stem, and was apical, and that was all that mattered to him. "Now, if you'll look at the flower again," started the professor. "You can see that it has two different whorls. What is a whorl again?" he asked then, looking towards the class to see if they had a decent answer for him. Kaidan's hand shot up this time in an effort to be the first to answer the question. "Go ahead Kaidan," said the professor. "A whorl is a group of sepals, petals or leaves that surround the stem, and radiate outwards from it," he said. Nodding once more the professor then continued with the lecture and demonstration. "Good, The orchids you see here have two whorls as I stated before. One consists of three sepals, that is the outer whorl, and the inner whorl consists of three petals. Now, if you very carefully pull back the petals and Sepal, you can see what looks like a lip on the lower portion of the flower. This is called a Labellum. It is utilized as a perch for pollinators such as bees or beetles to sit upon and gather nectar whilst the pollin from the anther's attaches itself to them," said the professor. And so Kaidan began to pull the edges of the petals backwards, to reveal the labellum of his orchid, and upon seeing it, he gently, and very carefully pulled it downwards to reveal what was behind it. "Now, you can't actually see the ovaries, but you can see the column that is referred to as the gynandrium, which the pollen generally travels down towards the ovaries. If you carefully pull down the lower lip of the labellum, you'll be able to identify the anthers, the protruding yellow pieces that carry the pollen upon them. When a pollinator enters the labellum to collect the nector from within the plant, it rubs up against the anthers, and will gather pollen that way," he said, sounding a bit more enthusiastic about what he was speaking about than earlier when Kaidan had drifted off into a daydream. "Now continue to peel back the petals, and this time look past the anther. You should, although they are pretty small, be able to identify the Stigma that happened to be situated directly behind the Anthers," he finished, and then awaited the students to follow his instructions and find the stigma of the plant. Kaidan peeled back the petals a bit more, and thus he revealed what he believed to be the stigma of the plant, directly in front of the column. Once that was revealed, and most of the students had found it, the professor continued on with his lecture. "Now for pollination theory behind the Orchid's pollination. We'll only go into the basics, no need for you to know the entire thing, unless you're truly interested in that, then you can speak with me after class is over. Orchids can either self-pollinate or cross-pollinated, that is to say, they pollinate with themselves, or other orchids. And each time an ovary is pollinated, it produces thousands upon thousands of seeds," said the professor, looking around the classroom to make sure everyone was paying attention to him. And since they were, he continued onwards with his lecture. "So, now that we have covered the flowers, and the basics of pollination with the orchids, we'll continue onto the stem and leaves of the plant..." he stated, and then motioned for everyone to look towards the stem and leaves that were upon the orchids. And so Kaidan did just that, in order to continue following the instructions the professor was giving, as well as learning more information about the orchid plants, one of the most common plants in Mizahar...

[Kaidan Arianos]

As Kaidan was examining the stem and leaves of the flower, the professor said, "Now, in order to see the ovary of the flower, which is located within the stem, directly below where the flower meets the stem, we are going to have to remove the flower from the stem, and cut the stem open. Carefully take your dissecting knife, and cut the flower off at it's base, the base of the corolla, where the calyx is at, and remove it from the plant." So Kaidan did just that, locating the calyx, he would take the knife, and with a hand upon the stem, he took the other hand (the one holding the dissecting knife), and cut the flower at the base, where the calyx happened to be. The flower fell into the soil, and Kaidan then began examining where he cut it, hoping that he did a good enough job so that he'd be able to continue on when the professor gave his next instructions. "Now, I want you to carefully, very carefully, make a slit on the side of the stem, from the calyx about three inches down the stem, not too deep, and not too much pressure upon the blade, or you will cut too deep, and destroy the ovary. We want to be able to see it intact," said the professor, demonstrating it on his own orchid that was in front of the class so that everyone could see how exactly to do it. Kaidan smiled as he watched, carefully observing what the teacher did, and then looking down towards his orchid in order to follow suit. Taking the dissecting knife, he'd carefully cut from the Calyx in a downwards motion, not too deeply, just enough to break the skin of the stem, about three inches downwards. The professor came around the class then making sure everyone had done there cuts properly. Some had not, some had, and luckily Kaidan managed to get it right the first shot, otherwise like some of the others, he'd be out of the experiment. Having understood the proper way of cutting it, only cutting the skin of the stem, and not what happened to be underneath of it, was key to doing the experiment correctly. As the professor passed by, he looked down towards Kaidan's plant, and then said, "Cut a little farther down the stem, so that we can see everything fully, you're almost there, but it needs to be a little farther down..." And so Kaidan did that, and cut even more so down the stem, in order to hopefully be able to reveal the ovary. "Now, I want you to all carefully peel back the skin of the stem, to reveal the ovules as well as the ovary. The ovary should be behind the ovules, further down the stem than the ovules. For those of you who have messed up, please see one of the other students who did it properly so that you can still examine where the Ovary and Ovules happen to be within an Orchid plant," said the professor, and another younger man came over to see Kaidan's work. As Kaidan pulled the skin of the stem back carefully, he'd see the ovules, and ovary within the stem. They just looked like two little balls of white that happened to be within the stem of the orchid. "Now, you can see the bundle of Ovules. Ovules are what create the seeds once they're fertilized, and the ovary for creating the bean of the plant. The bean is what carries the ovaries, also referred to as the ovary bundle, and travels up the stem from the ovary to where you see the bundle now, when a plant is ready to be fertilized," explained the professor, as he watched each of his students carefully examining each of their orchids. "Now that you're aware of the ovules and ovary, we shall continue on with the stem of the orchid, as well as the leaves," he then said, looking towards the class. "Cut the stem horizontally now, below where you made the slit in the epidermis of it, in order to cut off that piece, so we can see the interior of the stem," he said. So Kaidan took the dissecting knife, and cut directly under the three inch epidermal slit that he had made in the epidermis of the stem, horizontally, so that he could view the inside of the stem all the way, rather than just where the ovary and ovules happened to be. "Now you can see the pith, which is the circular part within the center of the stem, and you can see where the epidermis starts on the outside of the stem," said the Professor. "Now, we will talk about how the stem grows," said the professor. "There are two types of growth that can occur from the roots, these are Monopodial and Sympodial. Monopodial roots have only one stem shoot up from the roots, where as Sympodial have many shoots that come up from the roots of the plant," he then said, looking at each of the students in the classroom. "Can anyone tell me what type of orchids we have here?" he asked. Another student, other than Kaidan raised his hand before Kaidan could, and said, "These, of course, are monopodial stems, as only one of them has grown up from the roots..." Turning towards Kaidan, he gave him a smug look, as if to say, Ha, i got the answer before you, brown noser! Kaidan just ignored the look and continued to listen to what the professor had to say about stems and leaves. "Now, to change the subject a little bit, let us talk about the leaves of a plant. Where is it that leaves grow from? We know they have buds, but what are those buds called? Well, they are called apical meristems. And directly underneath of them is the auxillary bud. If a stem is cut off at a certain point, above an apical meristem, that auxillary bud will activate, and start to grow a new stem. This way the plant doesn't die if it's injured, or cut off at a certain point, so long as it's above the apical meristem and auxilary bud," said the professor as he looked towards Kaidan, and then the rest of the class. "Now, the parts of a leave. As I previously said, the leaf can grow from the apical meristem, and you have the epidermis, mesophyll, as well as the veins of a leaf... Any questions?" he asked. Kaidan didn't have any, and neither did the rest of the class it seemed. Instead Kaidan continued to take notes upon all of the information that his teacher was dishing out that day, on leaves, their structure, stems, their structure, and the ovary and ovules of the Orchid plant...

[Kaidan Arianos]

As Kaidan was looking over leaf structure in his notes, and listening to the professor continue speaking, he looked up towards him in order to better pay attention to what exactly happened to be saying at that next minute. "Now, we shall talk about root structure of the Orchid plant," he said simply, motioning towards the orchid that was sitting in front of him, already partially dissected. "What I'd like for you to do is to remove the orchid plant from the dirt it happens to be within. Carefully, the dirt is soft, so the roots should come out quite easily. This way we can examine them, and see exactly what their usage is in the plant. Most of you should already know this as we went over it with the Trumpet Pitchers, but it'll be a good review," he said, and so Kaidan, ever so carefully, gripped the orchid at the bottom of the stem, near where it entered the dirt, and began to pull up on it. Luckily the dirt was quite soft, and the plant removed itself quite easily, the roots still mostly intact, so that Kaidan could get a better look at them. As he examined them, he noticed they were mostly white, with a bit of brownish shading towards the bottom of them. They were in the shape of a ball, expanding outwards, and looking quite fat. He didn't know if the coloration had any special significance, but he would save that potential question for later, so as to not interrupt what the professor began to say next about the plant's roots. "Now, that you've all gotten the roots out mostly intact, we'll look at the structure of a root. These specific types of roots are called tubers. We believe that they are enlarged in order to store nutrients for a plant during the winter season, so that it may regrow the following year, without having to be replanted. In warmer climates, climates that don't necessarily have a winter, orchids don't have tuberous roots, instead they have regular roots, but since Zeltiva has a definite winter... the orchids we find near here happen to have tuberous roots," said the professor as he explained the tuberous roots to the class. "Now, in order to learn more about them, I want you to take your dissecting knife and cut the tuberous root in half, so that we can examine the inside of it. There really isn't much to see, but i'd rather you be aware of what the insides look like in order to learn the necessary parts of the root. First though, look closely to the root, and you'll see little hairs expanding from it. These are called root hairs. They increase the surface area of the root, so as to be able to absorb a lot more water, minerals and nutrients from the soil into the root, and thus providing more nutrients for the entire plant." So Kaidan began to examine it closely, and he did indeed see the little hairs that his professor happened to be speaking about at that moment. That was interesting, he thought, and then took his dissecting knife, as the teacher instructed, and began to dissect the root in half, so as to be able to see the interior of the tuber. Looking at it, it looked like a star shape was in the center of the tuber, and it had an obvious epidermis with the hairs sticking out from there. "Now, looking at the interior of the root, you'll see that it has an obvious epidermis, the layer of skin on the outside of the tuberous root. You'll also see a star shape in the center of it. This is referred to as the Inner Medulla or Pith. The same as the stem has in it, it's where the stem's pith expands outwards from. On the outside of the star, in between each points of the star are the outer medulla. Most of the nutrients are stored within the inner medulla, but there are extra nutrients that happen to be in the outer medulla as well, secondary nutrients if you will call them," said the professor, and indeed Kaidan was able to observe where the inner medulla happened to be as well as the outer medullas. "Now, we shall speak a bit upon the environment that the Orchid happens to live within. It's a fairly easy concept, as they can pretty much live within any environment in Mizahar, depending upon the species of orchid that we are speaking about," the professor continued, looking around the classroom to make sure that everyone was paying attention to him as opposed to anything else. "Within the tropics and sub-tropics of Mizahar, there are orchids that happen to be perennial epiphytes. These orchid will grow attached to trees, shrubs, or bushes. There are also some species of orchid that are called lithophytes. They grow upon rocks, or very rocky soil. Most species that we find around here are terrestrial though, and simply grow out of the dirt, not having to be attached to a rock, tree, shrub or bush. And finally, there are some species of Orchid that cannot grow without being attached to fungi, because they need extra nutrients. They are parasitic to the fungus that they are attached to, absorbing the necessary nutrients from them," the professor said, explaining a bit of the ecology behind the various species of orchid. In Kaidan's mind it seemed as though these orchids happened to have a variety of places they could survive in, and that it was definitely worth further research, apart from the knowledge he was obtaining this class period. If a plant like this had learned to survive under so many various conditions, he wondered if possibly cross-breeding it with another plant wouldn't possibly make it so that other plants could survive under the very same conditions that the orchids happened to be able to survive under. Many thoughts were racing through Kaidan's mind about everything he had learned that day, about orchids, their structure, their environment they could live in. It was a lot to take in, and Kaidan definitely had a ton of notes within his papers that he could easily read over the next few days, study, and become much more knowledgeable upon the subject of Orchids. "Are there any questions that the class has about orchids, their structure, their environment, or anything else that might pertain to the subject we've just learned about within the classroom today?" he then asked. As Kaidan, and it looked like the rest of the class didn't have any further questions, the professor nodded his head, and then said, "Very well, you have your notes, and you are free to go then, enjoy the rest of the day!" And so Kaidan took off for the rest of the day, wondering what Zip was doing, and deciding to go see if he wanted to do anything that day. He had enjoyed his class greatly, and felt a bit more knowledgeable upon the topic of orchids, as well as plants in general. The repetition of certain things they had learned earlier that season definitely allowed him the ability to memorize them better, in a better effort to learn more about them, the more in depth stuff anyways...

[Arcane]

Rewards and Treasure! Experience Points +5 Botany +3 Observation Lores University of Zeltiva Class: Botany Lesson on Orchids Botany: Flower of the Orchid Botany: Stem of the Orchid Botany: Leaf of the Orchid Botany: Root of the Orchid Botany: Ecology of Orchids Comments Like before, the "Botany:" prefix signifies specific, technical knowledge regarding the subject matter after the prefix, which makes it much more superior than a simple lore of "Flower of the Orchid". In other words, it represents all the in-depth characteristics and terminology related to the subject matter. Also, because I am quite unfamiliar with classification and categorization, do let me know if the lores I gave do not fully represent the knowledge gained. Just let me know what lores to award to represent any unrepresented knowledge. I didn't knew most of that, but well, thanks for the educational thread! xD