Have you ever wondered? There is a seemingly limitless supply of peanuts everywhere: in the grocery store, at the drug store, at the convenience store, in the stadium at the game, or even at some vendor on the side of the road. So why is it that in all my travels, I’ve never seen a peanut tree? This thought kept me up pretty late last night…
As it turns out, peanuts are not really nuts, and they don’t grow on trees. Peanuts are legumes, and that means they grow in the ground, like peas and beans. The plants grow to about 60cm and bear small yellow flowers for about half a day. After about four days, a “peg” grows out of the flower and into the ground, and a seed pod (peanuts in a shell) grows at the end of that peg.
Peanut plants are annuals, meaning that they complete their life-cycle after one year. Thus, when harvesting peanuts, the entire plant is dug up and new peanut seeds are buried in its place.
Links in this post
Related posts:
August 21st, 2009 at 11:53 pm
YES! We were wondering about the nut and seed correlation as well… as our usual friday night, my roommate and i were in a deep discussion of where a peanut originates from… among other concerns about edible seeds, nuts, and non edible seeds such as cherry pits. What happens to them? Why can you eat sunflower seeds and not other seeds? if seeds and nuts both reproduce shouldnt we be able to eat them all? yes, our friday nights are glamorous. Your website is amazing and answered a very probing question of ours…. and we thank you for that!