By: Shannon Havill, Emily Crosby,
Liam Q
Sample Organisms
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Ferns
Mosses
Liverworts
Hornworts
Archegonia
Habitat
• Non-vascular plants grow best in damp,
shaded conditions with rich soil to absorb
nutrients from.
• They typically grow in clusters in the
coniferous forest.
Principal
Characteristics
• The principle characteristics of non-vascular
plants are:
• They do not have any seed for reproduction.
• They also do not have any flower.
• They don’t have special tissues for nutrition
movement so they use diffusion to get
nutrition from the soil.
Life Cycle
• Vascular plants have special tissues that have cells to move
food and water throughout the plant. Some examples of
vascular plants are trees, shrubs and ferns. Non-vascular
plants don’t have these special tissues and cells. In order to
get nutrients they use diffusion to get nutrients from the soil
and move them up the roots to the entire plant.
• “Sporophyte" and "gametophyte" are the necessary
procedures of the life cycles of non-vascular plants.
• Non-vascular plants include mosses and liverworts, and a
generalized moss plant makes an excellent representative for
the typical non-vascular plant lifecycle.
Life cycle:
Sporophyte
• The sporophyte is a stalk with a capsule at the tip. This is
where the spores are released to reproduce.
• The life cycle and reproduction of non-vascular plants called
the "sporophyte". This structure makes and release spores.
They are released into the environment where they can
reproduce.
• Since non-vascular plants are non-flowering, and don’t have
seeds, spores are there only way to reproduce. The
sporophyte starts out green and as they mature they turn a
brownish color.
Life cycle :
Gametophyte
• With moist conditions, the newly released
spores can grow and mature. They will grow
into either male or female plants. "Gamete"
means reproductive cells and “Phyte" means
plant.
• It is the mossy green part of the moss plant
that we see.
Digestion
• In this sense non-vascular plants are like
vascular plants in that they obtain energy
through photosynthesis. They obtain energy
by converting light energy from the sun into
chemical energy and store it as glucose or
other organic compounds. As such they are
autotrophy like vascular plants. The
photosynthesis process normally takes place
in the upper parts of the plants.
Circulation
• The key difference between vascular and nonvascular plants are that non-vascular plants
have no circulatory system, this is the reason
they do not grow to be nearly the same size.
Since they lack the xylem needed to transport
water throughout, they are covered in waxy
cuticles that help absorb and keep water in as
they have no method of transporting it.
Corporal
Structure
• Because nonvascular plants are unable to absorb water, they
almost always remain low and flat.
• Consist largely of cylindrical stems, these stems that are
almost certainly symmetrical, moss possessing radial
symmetry while liverworts’ are bilaterally symmetrical.
• They have a cell wall made of cellulose.
• They are eukaryotic.
• They contain chlorophyll in order to obtain energy, they are
stored in appendages similar to leaves but it is worth noting
that they are not truly leaves as they lack the tissues
necessary to be considered as such.
Nervous System
• Non vascular plants do not have a nervous
system to transport food and water around
their body. Instead, they make their own food
and they get water from the air droplets.
• Non vascular plants do not move either. So
they have no need for muscles or joints.
• Non vascular plants do not have a nervous
system so they do not respond any stimuli.
Respiration
• Like in vascular plants, gas exchange in plants
is done through photosynthesis. This is the
process by which light energy is turned into
useable energy by the plant.
• The equation for photosynthesis is light +
6CO2 + 12H20 --> C6H12O6 + 6O2 + 6H20
• This means that water and carbon dioxide are
taken into the plant (along with light) and
release oxygen in it’s gaseous state (as it is
found in the atmosphere.
Facts
• Non vascular plants are also called bryophytes.
• Non vascular plants do not have roots, stems, or leaves.
• Non vascular plants have no vascular tissue.
• Nonvascular plants were the first to appear on earth’s soil and
evolve. Their physical structure allowed them to adapt over
time.
• Nonvascular plants--also known as seedless or flowerless
plants--are among the smaller varieties within the plant
kingdom.