ABC Radio National

Ockham's Razor





Date/Time 26 Dec 2014 2:59:26am
Both my parents were keen gardeners so plants have always been in my focus one way or another. It is, of course, almost pointless to state that without plants there simply would not be any life as we know it. Not only providing food (and medicine), habitat and beauty they also crucially convert carbon dioxide into oxygen. We destroy them at our peril. There are trees that live for thousands of years (a pine tree in California is believed to be 5,000 years was a seed at the time of the Ancient Egyptians) making them the oldest living things on Earth. They are also some of the largest living things with sequoias growing to 100m and 1,000 tonnes in weight. I was down in Deniliquin by the river where huge river gums 700 years old housed a veritable Hilton Hotel of all kinds of critters. They all depend on the tress and plants. Beautiful. Plants give us so much yet we plunder them, as I said, at our peril.
