this post was submitted on 22 Aug 2026
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Purple leaves are a thing.
That's from plants that get their air mostly from the shade and sunsets, so obviously they'd be less yellow and more dark and red.
I know this is a joke, but to be fair: the scientific consensus (now) is that the purple pigmentation acts as a sort of sunscreen against too much sunlight.
So they're like black plants
they are more dark green if they a understory plant, or a shaded plant. there of course plants that have no chlorophyll whatsoever. 2 types, one is mostly albino plants where they lose all thier chlorophyll, the other is mycoheterotrophic plants(either partial or fully). ever seen a albino redwood, apparently it lives off being attached to the roots of the parent plant where it came from or from nearby trees.
There's also an extremely tiny percent of plants that are entirely white, they don't get their energy through photosynthesis but instead a parasitic relationship of fungi and other plants.
Mycoheterotrophs! Love them, such bizarre little plants
I was so disappointed when I learned how hard (I mean I haven't actually tried it) to culture them, but it makes sense given how they occur.
Yeah I wouldn't try that in a million years, you need, like, an actual functioning ecosystem for them to flourish
partial and fully mycoheterotrophic orchids are fascinating. at least 1 kind is native to North america with many species(corallhiza, trifida being the most common since its a partial mycoheterotroph), gastrodia seems to be the most species rich MH.
they keep finding new thismia species(1 supposedly existed in america a century ago, but became extinct. the rest lives in South east asia, china, india, and australia area. they refind at least 2 thismia that went extinct but was found again in another area(T.kobensis, and T. neptunis). i find thismia the most fascinating one.
and South america has thier own thismia(its alleged that this is a different genus related to thismia), recently they seperated the African variety into its own family status.
Albino plants are a thing, but they usually are attached to the main plant where they came from. albino redwoods is an example. fully parasitic plants usually dont have leaves or have a small nonfunctional ones. some parasitic plants is exist as filaments inside a host(no stem no, leaves whatsoever)(rafflesia, pilostyles). the most famous is miseltoe, which is hemiparasitics, as it can sitll fully photosynthesize.
As is purple rain.