The "Telegraph Plant."

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 2 October 1914, Page 8

The "Telegraph Plant."

IT IS NEVER STILL.,

Here is a very strange plant, known as the "Moving Plant" or "Telegraph Plant." It originally came from the East Indies, and belongs to the same natural order as the sensitive plant. But in its motion it differs from the sensitive plant, inasmuch as the leaves have a rotary motion instead of a collapsing or folding one, such as the leaves of the sensitive plant have. In the moving plant the leaflets appear never to be at rest, even when there is no wind or air to set them in motion.

There are three leaflets on each leaf, and sometimes all three will be in motion; again only one. So there

is no regularity in their movements, and they may be seen moving either steadily or in jerks, in every conceivable direction. During the plant's entire life it is never quiet, nor is it ever entirely at rest. It is not uncommon for one leaflet to revolve while; others on the same stalk are perfectly quiet.