Apomixis facts for kids

Vegetative apomixis in the grass Poa bulbosa; bulbils form instead of flowers

Apomixis is a special way some plants (and a few animals) make new offspring. It's like a natural cloning process. In apomixis, a new plant grows from just one parent, and it's an exact copy, or clone, of that parent. This means there's no mixing of genes from two parents, and no fertilization is needed.

This method is most common in plants, especially flowering plants. For example, some types of brambles, like blackberry plants, use apomixis.

How Apomixis Works in Plants

In simple terms, apomixis in plants means a seed forms without the usual process of fertilization. Normally, a plant needs pollen (male part) to join with an egg cell (female part) to create a seed. But with apomixis, the seed develops directly from the mother plant's tissues. This process avoids meiosis, which is a special cell division that usually mixes up genes. Because meiosis is skipped, the new plant's embryo (the tiny plant inside the seed) is genetically identical to the parent.

Apomixis and Asexual Reproduction

In botany (the study of plants), apomixis is seen as a type of asexual reproduction. This means reproduction happens without the joining of male and female cells. It's different from how most plants reproduce, which is called sexual reproduction.

You might have heard of parthenogenesis in animals. This is a type of reproduction where an egg develops into a new individual without being fertilized. Apomixis is similar to parthenogenesis, but it's the term used for plants.

What Apomixis is NOT

It's important to know that not all ways of making new plants without seeds are apomixis. For example, when people grow new plants from cuttings (like a piece of a stem or a leaf), that's called horticulture or vegetative propagation. This is different from apomixis because apomixis is a natural process where a seed is formed, but in an asexual way.

Images for kids

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  Caribbean agave producing plantlets on the old flower stem.

See also

In Spanish: Apomixis para niños