🌱 HOW LAND PLANTS EVOLVED ROOTS
PAGE 1 OF 5, LIFE ON LAND WITHOUT ROOTS
THE ROOTLESS BEGINNING
WHEN PLANTS FIRST STEPPED ONTO LAND
Roughly 470 million years ago, simple plants began colonising bare rock and damp soil. These pioneers had no roots at all. Instead, their green stems and leaves soaked up water and minerals from rain and thin films of moisture wherever they touched the surface. They were small, often just a few centimetres tall, but they changed Earth forever by bringing photosynthesis onto dry ground for the first time.
⚡ DID YOU KNOW?
Early land plants like Cooksonia were tiny, forked stems with no leaves and no roots. They looked more like green twigs stuck to wet rock than the trees we know today.
ROOTLESS!
WHOLE-BODY DRINKING
💧 Water absorbed over the whole surface
🌧️ Rain and dew kept plants alive
🌧️ Rain and dew kept plants alive
DRY-LAND CHALLENGE
☀️ Sun and wind dried plants out fast
🪨 Anchoring to rock was difficult
🪨 Anchoring to rock was difficult