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Evergreen Trees.
Evergreen Shrubs . Evergreen
Plants
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Evergreen Plant
Characteristics
Evergreen plants retain their leaves all
year round as opposed to deciduous plants, which lose all their
foliage for a proportion of the year leaving them bare. Old
leaves shed soon after the new leaves appear.Leaf persistence
lasts for one to five years in some cases with the Great Basin
Bristlecone Pine lasting up to forty-five years.Evergreens
provide year round interest whether in the countryside national
parks of Sierra Nevada where magnificent Giant Sequoia grow or
the humble dwarf conifers in your own garden.For the gardener,
evergreens provide essential structure or 'bones' of garden
design. Choosing the right evergreens will give you long-term
enjoyment with the satisfaction of easy care. Choose the wrong
evergreen and you will have a constant battle controlling its
growth!
Reasons To Be Evergreen Or
Deciduous Deciduous trees drop their
leaves for a specific purpose which is usually self
protection as a defense adaptation to a cold or dry season,
when maintaining leaves is likely to become a liability,
threatening the existence of the plant.
Tropical Evergreen
Plants The majority of tropical
rainforest plants are evergreens. These plants replace their
leaves throughout the course of the year as the leaves start
to age and become less effective and not so beneficial for
the supporting the plants sustainability and so ultimatly
fall. All plant waste matter easilly rots down in the rain
forest, so providing essential growth nutrients for
established and newly sprouted plants.
In other areas where the
seasons change through an arid climate cycle, both evergreen
and deciduous plants thrive, having adapted to their own
envirinmental requirements very successfully.
Warm Temperate Evergreen
Plants On the whole, the majority of warm
temperate climate plants are evergreen. Again, the growing
climate and conditions dictate the success or failure of a
plant to adapt. Of course, the ideal place for plants to
thrive is a nice, warm, stable, well watered environment and
evergreens have adapted most successfully.
Cooler temperate climates
have fewer evergreen plants. Such areas produce an
abundance of conifers, as fewer evergreen broadleaf plants
are able to tolerate severe cold, with temperatures going
down to about -30 °C, -22 °F.
Seasonal Climate
Evergreen Plants
In seasonal areas where there may be a cold
or dry seasons, there are good survival reasons for a plant
being decidous. A plant being evergreen is usually a good
indication of adaptation to low nutrient levels. Deciduous
trees, for example, lose their nutrients whenever they drop
their leaves. It is essential for the tree to replenish
these lost nutrients from the soil so as to build new leaves
and promote growth.
In difficult times when
hardly any nutrients are available, evergreen plants have a
distinct survival advantage, even though their leaves and
needles must be capable of withstanding cold and, or severe
drought, and are consequently less efficient at
photosynthesis (The process used by green plants to turn the
energy of sunlight into chemical reactions that convert
carbon dioxide into oxygen and also produces sugars that
feed the plant).
In warmer climates with
both poor soil and ground conditions, some pines and
cypresses species grow very well.
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