Food for Noah's Ark survivors.

Not only do the technical aspects of planting cuttings make the "reforestation from cuttings" absurd, the simple fact is that there are only a few families of plants that will even grow from cuttings. The most common of course being Rutaceae (citrus), Rosaceae (well, roses among others), etc. What about the families that grow only (or mostly) from root stock (eg, Myrtaceae like eucalyptus) or copice (like Salicaceae such as willows and aspens)? None of those root-required plants would survive even a few weeks in salt-impregnated soil.

Indeed he did. He and Hooker had a mild on-going disagreement over the length of time a seed immersed in salt water could remain viable. Hooker, a botanist, espoused the then-conventional view that nothing could survive more than two weeks. Darwin, never adverse to challenging conventional wisdom (ABE: at least when it was relatively safe to do so), set out to conduct a series of experiments between 1855-57 to determine whether this was true or not. This was not as trivial a point as it may apppear - it was a key piece of supporting evidence that would permit (or deny) the possibility of common ancestry of plants found on isolated oceanic islands. Anyway, to make a long story short, Darwin discovered that three quarters of the seeds he tested were able to remain viable after immersion in salt water for four weeks - overturning the conventional wisdom at one go. The results were published in the now-long-defunct Gardener's Chronicles.As an interesting side note, Darwin discovered another problem while conducting the experiments - most of his seeds sank (IOW, couldn't be transported by ocean currents)! In all, he discovered that only about 14% of the seeds he tested could be transported by water without ill effects. This prompted a whole 'nother slew of experiments - looking at ducks' feet for seeds trapped in mud, pideon crops, etc - to find another possible mode of transport. And THAT worked. Those who say Darwin was just some whacked-out atheist looking for a way to deny God should look deeper at Darwin-the-scientist.Edited by Quetzal, : No reason given.