eli5: how do climbing plants “know” where to “reach” places where they can grab onto to grow up a surface? Ex: peas have those little green string “fingers” that they wrap around trellis in a garden.

Question

eli5: how do climbing plants “know” where to “reach” places where they can grab onto to grow up a surface? Ex: peas have those little green string “fingers” that they wrap around trellis in a garden.

In: Biology

Answer 1

There are time lapse videos of vines growing where you can see that their tendrils wave around in a corkscrew-like pattern as they grow upward until they discover something to grab on to, kind of like how you feel around in the dark for walls and objects.