Back to Biology Class

The other week I signed up for my first adult continuing education class held at Commack High School.  Although I never attended Commack H.S., it is an eerie feeling to walk through the empty, locker-lined halls as your own memories of high school creep up on you.  The night of my first class I felt like a freshman again hurrying through the labyrinth of corridors trying to find the correct classroom and hoping that the teacher wouldn’t notice as I snuck in late.  I scurried past the language hall, the history wing, the art classrooms, and, after getting myself completely turned around, past the science department.  Ah yes, I thought to myself, the good old science department.  Where everything a high school student ever needed to know about science could be learned in Earth Science, Biology, Chemistry, or Physics class.  Or could everything be?  I remember learning about the solar system in Earth Science, the inner workings of the digestive system in Biology, the components of the atom in Chemistry, and the law of gravity in Physics. 

Photo: Back to class

I was a hard-working student and excelled in all these classes.  But looking back now, I realize how much was left out of my and my classmates’ high school science education.  So many basic questions remained unanswered such as, Where does our food come from?  Where does our water come from?  How do you plant a tree?  What used to be on Long Island before strip malls and subdivisions?  I don’t mean to be overcritical of my high school (which is a School of Excellence I am reminded).  I am just raising the question of why are we pushing our kids to learn quantum mechanics and DNA gel electrophoresis when so many of them don’t know how to plant a seed?  And so, before I get too carried away, I am dedicating this article to one of our most basic biology questions…

What makes a fruit a fruit?  A fruit is the part of a flowering plant that houses the plant’s seeds.  Botanically speaking, the fruit is the part of a plant that develops from the ovary.  After the eggs are fertilized inside the ovary, they develop into seeds and the fruit ripens.  In common, everyday language, fruits must be sweet, but in the botanical definition, they do not have to be.  So pumpkins, corn, tomatoes, and chili peppers are all really fruits because they are flowering plants (not all plants are flowering) and they enclose the seeds of the plant.   

Photo: Eible, but not sweet - Red Chokecherry

Many fruits are edible because it is the plant’s tricky way of enticing people and other plant eaters to ingest the fruit and disperse its seeds.  Why does a plant want to disperse its seeds?  Because if all the seeds fell in one place and started growing beneath the mother plant, there would not be enough water, sunlight and nutrients for all of them.  And, of course, the plant wants to produce as many baby plants as possible.  Some plants use other tactics to disperse their seeds like wind, water, or being sticky and being carried on the fur of animals.  The seeds, not the fruits, are what give rise to other plants.  So plant some seeds in your yard in the spring and see what happens.

Photo: Surprisingly edible - Kousa Dogwood fruits

As I tried to navigate the maze of Commack H.S. the other night, I walked past posters for student clubs, student-painted murals, and athletic department trophy cases.  I hoped that these students were already learning answers to basic science questions and that our schools are teaching them the foundation for a sustainable and “green” future.