I can remember when I was young that we used to make dandelion chains by looping long stemmed dandelions together. My neighbors were talking about that the other day when I suddenly realized that I rarely see a long stemmed dandelion anymore. My friends I agreed that indeed, long stemmed dandelions seem to have disappeared. Last few days I've been looking around and I have spotted a few but not many.
My interest piqued, I tried googling the subject of dandelion evolution and I found out that some people have had the same observation. One article claims that its Darwinism at work. When I mow the grass, shorter dandelions are spared the blade and because of this, short stemmed dandelions are allowed to proliferate, their seeds spread all over the countryside. Whereas any long stemmed varieties are cut down before they can go to seed. As a result the dandelion has adapted to avoid the mower so to speak.
If your lawn is like mine with a few weeds here and there then you should notice some short stemmed dandelions survive the cut. Check it out, its really quite noticeable around here, long stemmed dandelions are all of a sudden hard to find.
Is this really evolution at work, even mildly? If so will long stemmed dandelions eventually disappear? Or is this just a suburban phenomena?
My interest piqued, I tried googling the subject of dandelion evolution and I found out that some people have had the same observation. One article claims that its Darwinism at work. When I mow the grass, shorter dandelions are spared the blade and because of this, short stemmed dandelions are allowed to proliferate, their seeds spread all over the countryside. Whereas any long stemmed varieties are cut down before they can go to seed. As a result the dandelion has adapted to avoid the mower so to speak.
If your lawn is like mine with a few weeds here and there then you should notice some short stemmed dandelions survive the cut. Check it out, its really quite noticeable around here, long stemmed dandelions are all of a sudden hard to find.
Is this really evolution at work, even mildly? If so will long stemmed dandelions eventually disappear? Or is this just a suburban phenomena?