Friday, May 11, 2012

Very, very old plants

Welwitschia mirabilis(2)
~1500 year-old Welwitschia mirabilis 
The Welwitschia plant from the Namibia dessert can live for up to 2000 years. What's really strange is that the leaves of Welwitschis are the parts that keep growing continuously. While the tips of the leaves eventually fray and die, the base keeps growing, pushing out new parts of the same leaf sort of like a vegetal pasta machine!

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