Desert Rhubarb (Rheum palaestinum)
Description
“Pet poisonous” – Toxic parts: leaves Rheum palaestinum, the desert rhubarb, is a plant indigenous to Israel and Jordan, with the most highly efficient water gathering capabilities known in botany. The plant has broad, rigid leaves, with a waxy surface, and channels cut into them that funnel any water that drops onto them toward its root, with enough force to cause deep soil penetration. An alternative explanation for the evolution of the unique morphology of the rheum's leaf is that the wrinkled leaf has specifically developed its unique "architecture" as a vapor-trap, tightly capping the ground to harvest water by sub-foliar condensation of vapor rising from the earth
Taxonomic tree
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Domain: Eukarya
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Kingdom: Plantae
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Phylum:
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Class: Magnoliopsida
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Order: Caryophyllales
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Family: Polygonaceae
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Genus: Rheum
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