01/08/2018
David Latimer is one of the world's few proud owners of an entirely self-sustaining bottled garden. Looking at pictures of the lush green bottle, you'd think that growing it involved a lot of hard work. But the truth is that David hasn't even watered it in over 40 years. It's just been sitting under the hallway stairs in his home and it's doing extremely well on its own.
The story of his this amazing experiment began in 1960, on Easter Sunday, when David decided that it would be fun to start a bottle garden. Since they were a bit of a craze back then, he wanted to see for himself what the fuss was all about. So out of idle curiosity, he got himself a 10-gallon globular bottle, poured some compost at the bottom and used a piece of wire to carefully lower a seedling in. Then he put in just about a quarter of a pint of water, and believe it or not, he only watered the plant once more in 1972. Never again after that. It has been alive and kicking for the past 54 years.
So what makes the spiderwort so special that it can grow with almost no outside help? The secret is really pretty simple -- the plant has been extremely successful at creating its own mini ecosystem. Using the little water that David gave the plant 42 years ago, it has managed to get a water cycle going inside the bottle. The water is taken up by the roots, released into the air through transpiration, condenses down into the potting mixture and the cycle repeats itself.
Through the glass, the leaves are able absorb as much light as they need to photosynthesize into energy that helps the plant grow. The oxygen created during photosynthesis also puts enough moisture in the air for it to 'rain' back down on the plant. As the leaves age, they drop to the bottom and rot, helping to create carbon dioxide (also needed for photosynthesis) and nutrients that are absorbed by the roots. At night, when there is no sunlight, the plant breaks down nutrients and uses cellular respiration to stay alive.
