The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins

Henry Mitchell, Washington Post Book World over that marvelous no man's land of mystical glimmerings into the nature of science and life itself.' bristles with plenty of hard facts and astounding scientific and practical lore.' Authors Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird suggest that the most far-reaching revolution of the 20th century - one that could save or destroy the planet - may come from the bottom of your garden. Hardly had this inquisitor left and the good man taken his place near the plant than the geranium was appeased, its impulses died down, the recorder traced out smooth one might almost say tender-lines on the graph.Exploring the world of plants and its relation to mankind as revealed by the latest discoveries of scientists, The Secret Life of Plants includes remarkable information about plants as lie detectors and plants as ecological sentinels it describes their ability to adapt to human wishes, their response to music, their curative powers, and their ability to communicate with man. If it could have, it would have either thrown itself out the window or attacked its torturer. The plant didn't just get 'nervous' it was afraid, it was horrified. When we electroded our instruments to the plant, what do you think? No sooner did the torturer come near the plant than the recorder of the instrument began to go wild. Another man took tender care of the same geranium, watered it, worked its soil, sprayed it with fresh water, supported its heavy branches, and treated its burns and wounds. He pinched it, tore it, pricked its leaves with a needle, dripped acid on its living tissues, burned it with a lighted match, and cut its roots. We had a man molest, even torture, a geranium for several days in a row. They are able to gather impressions and retain them over long periods.

When Soloukhin began to telephone his own friends in excitement he learned from one of them that a prominent member of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, working in Akademgorodok, the new town inhab ited almost exclusively by research scientists on the outskirts of Siberia's largest industrial center, Novosibirsk, had stated: Don't be amazed! We too are carrying out many experiments of this kind and they all point to one thing: plants have memory.

“Perhaps the elements of memory in plants are superficially treated,' he writes, 'but at least there they are in black and white! Yet no one calls his friends or neighbors, no one shouts in a drunken voice over the telephone: Have you heard the news? Plants can feel! They can feel pain! They cry out! Plants remember everything!'

The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins