clever little guys
tendril coiling begins with circumnutation of the tendril in which it is moving and growing in a circular oscillatory pattern around its axis. once the tendril finds a support stimulus, the touch signal releases a cascade of hormones that initiate contact coiling. they avoid twining around themselves or neighboring plants of the same species through signaling molecules released by the host plant which bind to chemoreceptors on the climbing plant’s tendrils–this process is called self-discrimination. it’s all quite clever, if you ask me.
wild grape vine tendril in winter
What I think is quite clever is that anybody figured how all this works. And it is quite cool!!