There are different types of plants such as flowering and non-flowering plants.
When you look close to a flowering plant, you see that these types of plants have many small details, they are usually colorful, and they have different parts that serve different purposes.
Flowering Seed Plants
Seed plants that are flowering and form ovaries are called angiosperms. When these angiosperms develop, the ovaries that are located in the flower helps the flower to develop into fruits.
The flowers attract pollinators, which are animals or insects that help to carry the pollen to the pistil, which is the place in the flower where the seeds form.
When these animals or insects carry the pollen, they help to spread seeds all over the area.
Parts of a Flower
A flower can be a male or female flower with reproductive structures that allow the flower to reproduce.
The reproductive structures of a flower include the stamen, pistil, petals and sepals.
Stamen
The stamen is the male reproductive structure of the flower that helps to produce pollen.
This structure looks like a stalk, called a filament and has an anther at the end of it.
The anther is full of pollen sacs and this is the place that meiosis, or reproduction happens and the pollen grains form.
Pistil
The pistil is the female reproductive structure of the flower that also helps to make pollen. The pistil is made up of a stigma, ovaries, and a style.
The stigma is raised, and it helps to catch pollen because it is sticky.
The style is part of the flower that helps to support the stigma and it connects with the ovary, and the ovary contains the egg.
Petals
The flower petals are useful because they help to attract pollinators, animals or insects, to the flower.
The flower has these colorful petals because brightly colored things are attractive and the pollinators like to stop on these colorful petals.
Sepals
The sepal helps to protect the flower while the flower is just a bud.
They are usually green in color because it helps them to hide the bud from insets and animals that might decide to eat the flower.
Sweet Scent
Have you ever smelled a flower and noticed the sweet aroma? Many flowers have this aroma so that pollinators will be attracted to the flower.
With the smell and the bright colors, animals and insects are attracted and when these pollinators visit the flower, they pick up pollen from the antlers and then as they go past or stop at other flowers, the pollen comes off on the stigma which helps cross pollinate or helps to form new seeds. These new seeds will eventually turn in to new flowers.
Characteristics of Flowering Plants
Flowering plants have parts that help to make and ripen fruits of the plant.
The fruits are also brightly colored, just like the flower, to attract animals and insects to eat the fruit and to help spread out the seeds.
Classification of Flowering Plants
There are hundreds of thousands of species of flowering plants and most of them are very different from each other.
Even though there are many species, flowering plants are labelled in three different groups, the magnoliids, eudicots and monocots. The groups are all different and have different tissues.
Facts About Flowering Plants
- Most seed plants are angiosperms, which means that they produce seeds in the ovaries of the flowers.
- The ovaries of the flower may develop into fruits.
- Pollen is a fine powder that is inside of a flower and pollen is needed in order for seeds to be made.
- Flowers can only make new seeds if they go through pollination.
- Pollination is when pollen is carried to the pistil of a flower.
- Bumblebees and butterflies are two pollinators.
- Dogs and cats can be pollinators too.
- Birds are considered pollinators because they carry seeds in their mouth and drop them in different areas as they fly.
What Did You Learn?
- What is the male reproductive structure of a flowering plant called? Stamen is the male reproductive structure of a flowering plant.
- How do fruits help flowering plants to reproduce? The fruits are eaten by animals and the seeds are dispersed throughout the area and then new flowers are formed.
- What is the purpose of a dog, cat, bird or even a butterfly that has to do with flowering plants? Animals and insects help to pollinate flowers by carrying pollen that gets stuck on them to different areas. Animals and insects also eat fruits that carry seeds and they help to drop seeds in different areas.
- What part of the flower helps to develop into fruits? The ovaries in a flower help to develop into fruits.
- What is the job of the sepal? The sepal helps to protect the flower while it is just a bud. The sepal is oftentimes green so that it can help to hide the bud from being eaten.
- Back to – Biology