Is it morning yet?
Happy Monday all and yes, it’s morning, at least in this neck of the woods. . . . This is Free Range, our Free Chat about an entire range 😉 of topics (we are freely chatting after all). Anything goes within reason, and we have an environmental bent, so a focus on all things plant, animal and mineral; earth, sea and sky, living and non-living, are topics of interest, humans included.
Today it’s all about sleep as Fall approaches and we begin to feel that non-Pandemic desire to hibernate. .. . .So how did everyone sleep last night?
Jellyfish……is this one sleeping? Actually, the jellyfish may be one of the few animals who never sleep because he has NO Brain; bullfrogs have brains but scientists have not been able to observe dormant activity in them day or night — always “ribbit, ribbit”, geez! Sleep wouldja? Cats however sleep enough for all of them. . . .
What about bugs? Do insects sleep?
Insects clearly rest at times and are aroused only by strong stimuli: the heat of day, the darkness of night, or perhaps a sudden attack by a predator. This state of deep rest is called torpor and is the closest behavior to true sleep that bugs exhibit.
ThoughtCo.
Most living organisms adapt their behavior to the rhythm of day and night. Plants are no exception: flowers open in the morning, some tree leaves close during the night. Researchers have been studying the day and night cycle in plants for a long time: Linnaeus observed that flowers in a dark cellar continued to open and close, and Darwin recorded the overnight movement of plant leaves and stalks and called it “sleep”. But even to this day, such studies have only been done with small plants grown in pots, and nobody knew whether trees sleep as well.
Sleep Better.Org
Just like humans, who work during the day and get their shut-eye at night, plants also work on the cycle of the Sun, and are known to have genes that switch on and off in what is known as a circadian rhythm. A circadian rhythm is basically a cycle that tells our bodies when to sleep, rise and eat, thus regulating many physiological processes. It turns out that trees might actually spend some of their evening hours “sleeping” too.
Now, this isn’t the kind of sleep that we’re used to. For example, trees often relax and let their branches droop when the sun goes down. Apart from that, they also shut down certain processes, such as photosynthesis. When the sun goes down, the plant’s focus shifts to delivering glucose throughout the plant.
Science ABC
Source: Science ABC Animal How SleepBetter.Org New Scientist Sleep.Org
