Interesting Fact About Climbing Vines

[M Farooq]

I recently learnt an interesting fact about climbers which rather surprised me. Just as we are left handed, right handed or ambidextrous in writing, climbing vines have a property of handedness as well!
A careful observation of twining climbers (e.g. morning glories) will reveal that some vines always twine around a support in clockwise direction and some vines will always twine in anticlockwise direction. Most vines will wrap clockwise around a support no matter what. Apparently, this phenomenon is not well understood completely.


Note the anti-clockwise twining habit of morning glories (only 10% of vines are said to climbing in anti-clockwise direction)

Picture from: http://www.granny-miller.com/do-you-kno ... ines-grow/

[Mustansir Billah]

Amazing!

[Munir]

Interesting. Farooq, you might as well research the reasons- just for interest.

[ka_khan]

Interesting find.

[M Farooq]

Interesting. Farooq, you might as well research the reasons- just for interest.

There must be fundamental reasons for this behaviour. But I can only quote the ayat now "Indeed, in the creation of the heavens and the earth and the alternation of the night and the day are signs for men of understanding".

Unfortunately, we have stopped thinking about simple things around us. The deeper we think about simple observations, the more miraculous they become. Just as I came to know that our favourite raat-ki raani plant does not care about day and night...as most of us assume. It has its own biological clock which tells the flowers to emit fragrance after every 12 hours. The 12 hour biological clock inside the plant has been designed in such a way that it matches with our days and nights.

[Tahir Khan]

Farooq sb, do you think there is any contribution of some type of 'Auxins' produced in the growing tips of plants that can alter movement and anti-clockwise rotation of vines or is it just Geo-physical phenomenon ?

[M Farooq]

Farooq sb, do you think there is any contribution of some type of 'Auxins' produced in the growing tips of plants that can alter movement and anti-clockwise rotation of vines or is it just Geo-physical phenomenon ?

Tahir bhai, your idea is a very interesting idea (I have sent a pm related to your auxin idea).
The observations are:
1. Most vines are right handed (in the if you curl your right hand with your thumb up, your fingers curl anti-clockwise)
2. Very few vines are left-handed (curl your left hand, thumb up, fingers curl in clockwise direction).
3. Some vines species are right hand and left handed...just like few people who can write with both boths :-)
4. It does not matter: geographical or geological location, direction of sun, which makes people think that this direction is programmed in a given species).

Correction in the original post: Most vines like to climb anticlockwise not clockwise...like morning glories. Actually, I came up with this idea while reading about Bengal Clock Vine (Thunbergia grandiflora). It is called a clock vine because it winds clockwise around a support.

[mikhurram]

Even in Wisteria the Chenesis variety more commonly found tends to climb counterclockwise and the Floribunda variety also known as the Japanese Wisteria exhibits the clockwise behaviour.

[newton]

Even in Wisteria the Chenesis variety more commonly found tends to climb counterclockwise and the Floribunda variety also known as the Japanese Wisteria exhibits the clockwise behaviour.

The reason behind that sir is the law of physics, the Coriolis effect and how individual atoms move when either in the southern or northern hemisphere.

It is important to know that all climbing plants native of the northern hemisphere (north) wind and twist in an anti-clockwise direction and all of those native of the southern hemisphere (south) wind in a clockwise direction. It is the same direction of rotation we see when we pull the plug of a bath tub filled with water. In the north water will turn in an anti-clockwise direction and in the south it turns in the opposite (clock-wise) way. This phenomenon is caused by the earth's rotation. Deeper within an object the atoms and the very air/wind around them are influenced by the magnetic forces at play.

Why then does the Japanese wisteria wind around in a clockwise direction when Japan is in the northern hemisphere (between 30° and 45° parallel to the earth)? - Because, some millions of years ago, Japan was in fact part of the southern hemisphere, but like a floating platform, it sailed across the earth's crust towards North at the speed of a couple of centimetres a year without ever sinking into the tropical or subtropical oceans until finally reached the moderate zone where it is now. The journey has been so slow that the plants had time to evolve and adapt to the different climate conditions.

This explains the great difference there is between the spontaneous Japanese flora in comparison to the Korean and Chinese ones. It also explains why there are so many earthquakes on that land, being the long journey still on going today! And the wisteria? In their DNA, there is obviously still something which tells them to move in that direction, even if they have been in the northern hemisphere for quite some time now

Regards
Ifzaal

[mikhurram]

Great and interesting information.