Evolutionary Anachronism

By Anupum Pant

The mango tree, the avocado tree, and the ginko biloba shouldn’t be here. They should have been long dead.

Trees depend on animals or other such external agents to disperse their seeds. As animals can’t breakdown seeds, they eat the nice fruits and let the seeds out in some other place where a new plant grows.

But the trees I mentioned above have either seeds that are massive, or have stinky seeds like the ginko biloba. These plants depended on animals that no longer exist. The avocado tree, for instance depended on probably a massive ground sloth who could eat the avocados whole without choking to death. Or Ginko biloba probably depended on an animal which loved those stinky seeds. They are long gone. But the trees live by. Thanks to us humans – who plant mango trees and avocado trees because they are tasty. and the Ginko biloba because they give a nice shade.

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