Walvis Bay, Namibia - Day 2, #2 of 3

What is there to do when you bus breaks down in the Namib desert and you are waiting for 2 hours in the largest desert in the World (to some of you this story will sound familiar since we broke down last year in the Judaean Desert in Israel after visiting the dead sea ... on Shabbat)?

We spent much of the time studying the Welwitschia plant (looks like wilted lettuce). It thrives in this very specific environment here in an area that is between 300-500 meters above sea level. It produces only two leaves (they break apart) in their 300 to 2000 year life span! The ones we saw were 500-800 years old.

The area receives no rainfall during some years and averages fewer than 4 inches per year. The Welwitschia has an elongated shallow root system consisting of a tapering taproot with one or more non-tapering extensions and a network of spongy roots. The roots extend to a depth roughly equal to the span of the living leaves from tip to tip. The main stem consists of an unbranched woody crown roughly shaped like an inverted cone. Very weird? And then there is the female and male variety of this plant which are separated (often, by a pretty long distance as we observed). How do they possibly fertilize .. who knows .. I guess I need to go back to biology (we did see some insects that must do the job).

Nature sure knows how to adapt! Want to find one? They only lie within the Namib Desert southwards from the Bentiaba River in southern Angola, to the Kuiseb River in Namibia, and up to 62 mi inland of the coast. Have fun.Leggi altro