Ask A Scientist© Botany Archive

name        Lisa K.
status      student
age         10

Question -  How do flowers get their smell?
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Two pages possibly helpful.  Basically there are different chemicals
produced by plants which make their fragrances.

http://www.icr.org/goodsci/bot-9709.htm
http://www.csa.com/crw/old/96perfumes2.html

Anthony R. Brach
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Flowering plants produce volatile chemicals that evaporate into the air
and produce their fragrance (pleasant or sometimes unpleasant -- at least to
humans). Presumably, this is to attract pollenating insects, but this is not
necessarily so, because we don't know that insects "smell" the same way
humans, or even other animals, do.

You raise an interesting question that I don't have an answer for: "Why do
humans find the fragrances of most flowers pleasing? What in our
evolutionary process for both humans and for flowers makes this rather
universal connection favorable to survival, assuming there is a connection."
Hmmm--a very interesting subject for a research paper for you in your
science class, or even a class project.

Vince Calder
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