What are plants?
Q: What are plants?
A: Plants are one of five big groups (kingdoms) of living things. They are autotrophic eukaryotes, which means they have complex cells, and make their own food. Usually they cannot move (not counting growth). Plants include familiar types such as trees, herbs, bushes, grasses, vines, ferns, mosses, and green algae.
Q: How many species of plants have been identified?
A: The scientific study of plants has identified about 350,000 extant (living) species of plants.
Q: Where do most plants grow?
A: Most plants grow in the ground with stems in the air and roots below the surface. Some float on water.
Q: What does a plant need to live and grow?
A: A plant needs sunlight, carbon dioxide, minerals and water to make food by photosynthesis.
Q: What is chlorophyll?
A: Chlorophyll is a green substance found in plants that traps the energy from the Sun needed to make food. It is mostly found in leaves inside plastids which are inside leaf cells.
Q: What is transpiration?
A: Transpiration is when evaporation of water from pores in the leaves pulls water through the plant.
Q: What does "plant" mean besides a type of living organism?
A:"Plant" can also mean the action of putting something in the ground such as farmers planting seeds in a field.
