Sectionalfolia podius
Sectionalfolia Podius is a species in zone 26 that is a free-floating seaweed type species. The seaweed can photosynthesize and is colored very light green so that it can reflect most of the light from the harsh heat of zone 26. The leaves are based in a spiral around the body, helping the plant stabilize itself in the water. The weed has a unique way of ridding itself from salt. Certain leaves in the plant (near the base) are dedicated toward ridding the plant of salt. These leaves fill up with the salt in the plant and then fall off. They fall to the sea floor to rot. The leaves buoy themselves by means of a bubble at the encased at base of each leaf. They usually create large masses of plants floating at the or near the surface of the sea.
Reproduction. Sectionalfolia podius reproduces by means of asexual and sexual reproduction. They can reproduce asexually by splitting the stems apart at the nodes. They can also reproduce sexually by waterborne pollen. This waterborne pollen goes into the flowers that are at the tip of each leaf. The flowers, as they start out, are around 1/2 cm long. They are round and nearly white. The stamens encircle the main flower. After fertilization, the tips grow in size (to the size of grapes) and nearly white. These tips are buoyant to keep the plant floating higher in the water so the plant can get more sun and thus more energy for the growing seeds. Once the seeds mature they get heavier and drop down off the plant to the ocean floor. The seeds will form roots; get nutrients from the dropped leaves and grow in the detritus. After a month or two, the plant will break off from the ground and become free-floating, the roots are left in the detritus; they die and rot.
This plants main defense are its extremely salty lower leaves. Not many organisms can deal with the amount of salt in these leaves. Once an organism tastes it once they will not want to taste it again.
