Daily Devotional – August 19

Botany

Have you considered how seeds get moved around the Earth? Land plants are stuck in one spot by their roots. They can’t move, so God designed their seeds to be moved around. God’s creativity and imagination in this area is astounding. Seeds are dispersed by wind, water, ingestion, hitchhiking, and exploding into the air. They are designed with parachutes, barbs, airfoils, draglines, airbags, wings, hooks, and rocket shapes. If wind is being used to disperse the seed, how would that seed be designed? Lightweight and maybe with a wing or parachute to give it more lift to float it afar. If water is being used to disperse a seed, the seed is designed waterproof and floatable. If animals are used to disperse seeds, they need to eat the fruit first.

The seeds within the fruit must remain undigested as they pass through digestive systems before being deposited in another place. If hitchhiking, then the seed needs hooks and barbs to attach itself to the animals’ skin, feathers, or fur. If the seed is thrown from the plant, it would involve lots of physics. For instance, once the seeds are ripe, a squirting cucumber literally shoots its seeds as much as 40 feet away!

When you go for a walk in the meadows or woods, look to see God’s creativity in how He designed a stationary plant to move around the world.

Then the earth shall yield her increase.

~ Psalm 67:6

Source: "Pearls in Paradise" by authors Bruce Malone and Jule Von Vett

References for this devotional.