ape plants is to take a ripened vine in the fall and cut
it in pieces with two or three buds and plant them so that one or both
of the buds are covered with soil. The pieces will take root and in
the spring will send up new shoots and thus form new plants.

You can obtain new plants from geranium, verbena, nasturtium and many
other flowering plants, by cutting and planting slips or parts of the
stems from them.

In parts of the South new sweet potato plants are obtained by cutting
parts of the stems from growing plants and planting them.

Florists produce large numbers of new plants by taking advantage of
this function of stems.

=Experiment.=--Take a white potato which is a thickened stem and place
it in a warm, dark place. It will soon begin to sprout or send out new
stems, and as these new stems grow the potato shrinks and shrivels up.
Why is this? It is because the starch and other material stored in the
potato are being used to feed the new branches. When we plant potatoes
in the garden and field the new plants produced from the eyes of the
potato are fed by the stored material until they strike root and are
able to take care of themselves.

All stems store food for the future use of the plant.

Annual plants, or those which live but one year, store food in their
stems and leaves during the early part of their growth. During the
fruiting or seed forming season this food material is transferred to
the seeds and there stored, and the stems become woody. This is a fact
to bear in mind in connection with the harvesting of hay or other
fodder crops. If we let the grass stand until the seeds form in the
head, the stem and leaves send their nourishment to the seeds and
become woody and of less value than if cut before the seeds are fully
formed.

In plants of more than one year's growth the stored food is used to
give the plant a start the following season, or for seed production.

The rapid growth of leaf and twig on trees and shrubs in spring is
made from the food stored in the stem the season before.

Sago is a form of starch stored in the stem of the sago palm for the
future use of the plant.

Maple sugar is made from the food material stored in the trunk of the
maple tree for the rapid growth of twig and leaf in the spring.

Cane sugar is the food stored in the sugar cane to produce new plants
the next season.

If we examine the stem of a tree that has been cut down we find that
it is woody, that the w