permaculture

[Food Forests <foodforests@mac.com>]

A desert plant has apparently figured out how to water itself.

Ecologists had been puzzling over the desert rhubarb for years: Instead of 
the tiny, spiky leaves found on most desert plants, this rare rhubarb boasts 
lush green leaves up to a meter wide. Now scientists from the University of 
Haifa-Oranim in Israel have discovered that ridges in the plant’s giant 
leaves actually collect water and channel it down to the plant’s root system, 
harvesting up to 16 times more water than any other plant in the region.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/07/irrigatingplant/

also: 

SESTO FIORENTINO, Italy -- Professor Stefano Mancuso knows it isn't easy 
being green: He runs the world's only laboratory dedicated to plant 
intelligence.
At the International Laboratory of Plant Neurobiology (LINV), about seven 
miles outside Florence, Italy, Mancuso and his team of nine work to debunk 
the myth that plants are low-life. Research at the modern building combines 
physiology, ecology and molecular biology.
"If you define intelligence as the capacity to solve problems, plants have a 
lot to teach us," says Mancuso, dressed in harmonizing shades of his favorite 
color: green. "Not only are they 'smart' in how they grow, adapt and thrive, 
they do it without neuroses. Intelligence isn't only about having a brain."

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2007/10/veggie_intelligence