Wildlife
Plants
Plants form a kingdom which includes groups that reproduce by spores, such as mosses and ferns, and groups that reproduce by seeds, such as conifers and flowering plants. Plants get their energy through photosynthesis, using sunlight to convert water and carbon dioxide into sugar and releasing oxygen as a by-product - perhaps the most important biological process on Earth.
Watch video clips from past programmes (15 clips)
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Lake Rankul
Realms of the Russian Bear
Plants are adapted to the desert-like conditions of high altitude lakes.
Plants are adapted to the desert-like conditions of high altitude lakes.
Photosynthesis at work
The Private Life of Plants
Leaves are the food making factories for all plants.
Leaves are the food making factories for all plants.
Perfect pump
The Private Life of Plants
Trees are incredibly efficient engines, able to pump water to great heights.
Trees are incredibly efficient engines, able to pump water to great heights.
Hay fever and pollen
Private Life of Plants
Hay fever - it's just pollen in the wind.
Hay fever - it's just pollen in the wind.
Climbing plants
The Private Life of Plants
In rainforests, plants must climb to reach sunshine.
In rainforests, plants must climb to reach sunshine.
Explore this group
Plant size range
A comparison of plant sizes - from the 115m tall sequoia (giant redwood) to the 3m tall titan arum.
About
Plants are living organisms belonging to the kingdom Plantae. Precise definitions of the kingdom vary, but as the term is used here, plants include familiar organisms such as flowering plants, conifers, ferns, mosses, and green algae, but do not include seaweeds like kelp, nor fungi and bacteria. The group is also called green plants or Viridiplantae in Latin. They obtain most of their energy from sunlight via photosynthesis using chlorophyll contained in chloroplasts, which gives them their green color. Some plants are parasitic and may not produce normal amounts of chlorophyll or photosynthesize.
Precise numbers are difficult to determine, but as of 2010[update], there are thought to be 300–315 thousand species of plants, of which the great majority, some 260–290 thousand, are seed plants (see the table below).
The scientific study of plants is known as botany.
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Classification
- Life
- Plants
BBC News about Plants
- Planets 'may have black plants' Planets in distant star systems may have black plants, according to new research by British astronomers.
- New mistletoe species discovered
- Wild food crops to be 'rescued'
- More species slide to extinction
- In pictures: Queen of the Andes
- Hungarian spill plant to reopen
- Earliest land plants discovered
Video collections
Take a trip through the natural world with our themed collections of video clips from the natural history archive.
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Timelapse photography: speeding up life
Some of the most memorable sequences in natural history result from timelapse photography, an astonishing filming technique that opens our eyes to a whole new world.
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The wildlife of Life
In autumn 2009, a major new series brought us life as we've never seen it before.
Elsewhere on the web
- Green plants on the Tree of Life (tolweb.org)
- Introduction to the plant kingdom (ucmp.berkeley.edu)
- Plant (wikipedia.org)
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BBC links
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