Did you know that some plants spread their seeds by exploding?

In March of 2003, police raced to the home of a gardener in Germany who reported gunshots coming from his garden. When they arrived, the police also heard the cracking shots and took cover. However, they soon discovered that the shots weren’t coming from a lone gunman – they were coming from the gardener’s wisteria seeds!

Plants depend on seeds to reproduce, but there are many different ways that plants use to spread those seeds around. Some, like burrs, use hitchhiking seeds that stick to the fur or feathers of a passing animal and drop off in another place. Some seeds fly, like maple keys that whirl away from the tree, or dandelions that drift away from their parent plant on a silky parachute.

Some, like coconuts, float away on a current of water. Others, like many fruits, have to be eaten by animals and spread to another place in the animal’s poop.

But one of the most spectacular ways of spreading seeds is by explosion. There are many species of plants that spread their seeds this way, like the gardener’s wisteria. Wisteria forms long hanging seed pods that dry out as they age, and as they dry, tension in the pod becomes so high that the seed pod cracks open and flings the seeds away.

The Himalayan balsam is also nicknamed the “touch-me-not” plant, because its seed pods explode spectacularly at the smallest nudge!