What are the plants in the desert
In the hot sand and extreme drought, desert plants are performing a shocking miracle of life. These seemingly fragile life forms hold the ultimate code to rewrite the rules of survival. Today we will delve into the survival records of five desert pioneers and unveil their unique skills to combat death.
Desert Monarch: Cactus
The survival wisdom of the water storage master
As a symbolic species of the desert, cacti have evolved a unique Crassulacean Acid Metabolism (CAM) system: closing the stomata during the day to reduce water evaporation and absorbing carbon dioxide at night. Their waxy epidermis acts as a natural sunscreen, reducing water loss to 1/6 of that of ordinary plants. In the Chihuahua Desert of Mexico,巨型 cacti can store up to 3,000 liters of water, equivalent to a human's drinking water for three years.
Perfect evolution of defense system
From the 0.5 cm star cactus to the 15-meter tall column cactus, more than 2,000 species of cacti construct a three-dimensional defense network with their thorn arrays. These specialized spines not only deter predators but also condense dew in the morning, guiding water droplets to the root system through surface microgrooves.
Desert Medicine Cabinet: Aloe
Self-repairing liquid gold
Native to the arid zones of Africa, aloe vera contains 75 active ingredients in its gel-like leaf flesh. When the leaves are damaged, aloe vera can self-heal the wound within 48 hours, making it a designated radiation protection plant for the NASA space station. In the coastal areas of Fujian, people have found that aloe vera can maintain a survival rate of over 90% in saline-alkali soil.
Climate regulation expert
The white spots densely distributed on the aloe leaf surface are not decorative, but a special light reflection layer. Tests have shown that this structure can make the leaf surface temperature 8-10℃ lower than the ambient temperature, and it can also release stored moisture at night.
The Three Sand Fixers: Red Willow, Golden Barrel, Poplar
Red Willow's Root Miracle
In the Taklamakan Desert, the roots of red willow can vertically reach 40 meters deep and horizontally expand up to 100 meters. Each mature red willow can stabilize 10 cubic meters of flowing sand, and its branches can sprout new roots after being buried by sand, forming a unique layered sand-fixing structure.
Golden Barrel's Geometric Survival
What are the plants in the desert
The perfect spherical shape of the golden barrel cactus achieves the optimal surface-to-volume ratio, which can minimize the area exposed to the sun in the Mexican desert. Its golden hard spines are actually modified leaves, with each thorn base having a miniature water storage sac.
Poplar's Time Magic
The poplar forest in Ejina Banner has three survival modes: the seedlings have long and slender leaves like willows, the adult trees have fan-shaped leaves, and the old trees can grow three types of leaves simultaneously. This morphological change allows it to maximize water utilization at different growth stages.
Desert Revelation
When we turn our attention to the saxaul forests in Inner Mongolia, we will find that these master survivors are reshaping the desert ecology: the thorn thickets of golden barrel cacti become micro-oases for lizards, the withered wood of poplars nurtures new life, and the blooming red willows attract migrating bee swarms. These adaptation mechanisms are not only masterpieces of natural evolution but also provide valuable models for humans to deal with climate change — in extreme environments, life can always find its own way out.