A dodder plant begins its life looking like a tapeworm. The tiny plant, which will never grow leaves or roots, elongates in a spindly spiral. Round and round it swirls, searching for a host plant.

The plant genus Cuscuta consists of more than 200 species that can be found almost all over the world. The parasites, known as dodder, but also called wizard's net, devil's hair or strangleweed, feed ...

About 4,000-5,000 parasitic plant species exist. Among these, dodders (Cuscuta, Convolvulaceae) are distributed worldwide. Compared with normal autotrophic plants, they have a unique morphology - they ...

Dodder is an obligate parasite of certain plants. This unusual member of the morning glory family is also known as “Angel’s Hair” and “Strangle Weed.” Like Indian pipe, another parasitic plant, Dodder ...

Jim Westwood, professor of plant pathology, physiology, and weed science, examines dodder, a parasitic plant with a covert weaponry system. Research at Virginia Tech and Penn State that has revealed ...

Most plants produce flowers when their leaves detect environmental cues that indicate the time is right. Parasitic dodder plants cheat. These plants don’t have leaves or roots of their own. Instead, ...

Dodder is an annual parasitic plant that consists of thin thread-like stems and quickly attaches itself to a host plant. One of my traveler friends sent me a photo of her flowers invaded by a strange, ...

Field dodder is an obligatory stem and leaf plant parasite that causes significant damage in field and vegetable crops in all agricultural regions of the globe. Selective and effective measures to ...

Parasitic dodders use outgrowths called haustoria to leech water and nutrients from their host plants. Jingxiong Zhang, Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China Parasitic ...

Interactions between species can have cascading effects that shape subsequent interactions. For example, herbivory can induce plant defenses that affect subsequent interactions with herbivores, ...

Researchers have investigated how the parasitic dodder Cuscuta australis controls flower formation. They showed that the parasite eavesdrops on the flowering signals of its host plants in order to ...