Seeds That Fly

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seed
maple
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fruits
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Seeds T hat Fly
By Ron Fridell
Everyone knows that birds can fly. But did you
know that some seeds can fly, too? Seeds from
maple trees look like airplane wings. In spring,
they fall from the tree and spin like little
helicopters. A breeze can carry a spinning
maple seed for miles.
Scientists wondered
how the seeds
could fly. How
could they stay
in the air for an
hour? How could
they fly so far?
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Illustration by Cende Hill
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Plant Word Search
Spinning helps maple seeds “fly” farther.
See Seeds That Fly on page 2
1
Seeds T hat Fly
Write About This!
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© Jupiterimages Corp.
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Get hold of some maple seeds
and fly them yourself. They’re fun
to watch. Drop them from a chair
or a stairway and watch them spin and glide.
Draw colorful pictures to go with your story.
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© iStockphoto.com/Benzo
© iStockphoto.com/
Sergey Katykin
Draw It!
A spinning maple seed works just like the wings
of a bird. It pulls air up from under the wing.
This pulling force makes the wing
rise and glide. Maple seeds
fly just like birds do!
Maple seeds and
bird wings have
similar shapes.
Do you know the story of Jack and
the Beanstalk? It’s about a plant
that grew so tall that it climbed
through the clouds to a giant’s
castle. Write your own
make-believe story
about a huge plant.
rp
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The scientists built a
machine to find out.
Some plant
seeds travel
This machine held a
hundreds
big model of a maple
of miles in
seed and made it spin
windstorms!
around. Scientists
watched the seed spin
over and over again until they found the secret.
Co
Continued from page 1