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Biomass  [ BotanyEcology  ]

Dictionary of botanic terminology - index of names

     
  The total quantity or mass of living material within a specified area at a given time. Often refers to vegetation.  
     
The biomass is the total weight of living organisms or total weight of dry organic matter or stored energy content of one or more living organisms that is present at a specific time in a defined unit of the Earth's surface (species biomass), or of all the species in the community (community biomass), or of all organic matter in a given ecosystem (ecosystem biomass), or the total mass of living organisms in a given volume or mass of soil (soil biomass) or also the total mass of  microorganism in  in a given volume or mass of soil (microbial biomass).

In a more general definition the biomass is any material, excluding fossil fuels, that was or is a living organism living organisms, usually expressed in weight per unit area or as the carbon, nitrogen, or caloric content per unit area.
It includes forest and mill residues, agricultural crops and wastes, wood and wood wastes, animal wastes, livestock operation residues, aquatic plants, fast-growing trees and plants, soil and aquatic microorganism and municipal and industrial wastes.
     

 


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Holdfast roots  [ Botany  ]

Dictionary of botanic terminology - index of names

 
     
  Some species of climbing plants develop holdfast roots which help to support the vines on trees, walls, and rocks. By forcing their way into minute pores and crevices, they hold the plant firmly in place.  
     
Climbing plants, like the poison ivy (Toxicodendron radicans), Boston ivy (Parthenocissus tricuspidata), and trumpet creeper (Campsis radicans),  develop holdfast roots which help to support the vines on trees, walls, and rocks. By forcing their way into minute pores and crevices, they hold the plant firmly in place. Usually the Holdfast roots die at the end of the first season, but in some species they are perennial. In the tropics some of the large climbing plants have hold-fast roots by which they attach themselves, and long, cord-like roots that extend downward through the air and may lengthen and branch for several years until they strike the soil and become absorbent roots.

Major references and further lectures:
1) E. N. Transeau “General Botany” Discovery Publishing House, 1994
   

 

 

 

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