Plants, so predictable, stay where they are. And yet, like all living things, they also move: they grow, adapt, shed leaves and bark, spread roots and branches, snare pollinators, and reward cultivators. This book, the first to thoroughly explore the subject since Darwin's 1881 treatise on movements in plants, is a comprehensive, up-to-date account of the mechanisms and the adaptive values that move plants.

Drawing on examples across the spectrum of plant families--including mosses, ferns, conifers, and flowering plants--the author opens a window on how plants move: within cells, as...