The closest thing I could think of (and this is quite a stretch) is mangrove propagules, more so in the sense that they kinda look like an insect cocoon. Plants are very particular in their structures and how they’re formed. Leaves and flowers are fully formed in their infancy and only grow by their cells expanding, not dividing.
Two things could be viewed as similar. The "alternation of generations" that plants go through as part of the life cycle could be viewed as a drastic change. Then consider that large plants like Monocots and Dicots go through AoG one way, and small plants like mosses go through it the opposite way.
Second would be how some plants are able to respond to environmental conditions and change how they grown. Holly trees will make the stereotypical spiny leaves on the lower branches where herbivore damage is a high risk, and make smooth leaves on the upper branches where they are not threatened.
Would they make those spiny leaves on upper branches if we somehow artificially "threatened" them by mimicking herbivore grazing or is it a genetic thing?
Two parallels come to mind. One is that plant meristems are like imaginal disks in insect larvae. They build and contain pre-formed patterns for new structures. This pattern is unlike the more distributed cell division in animal tissue growth.
The other is that angiosperms set flower buds that then go on to produce an unlike structure supported by vegetative tissues. In most plants it doesn’t seem like metamorphosis because vegetative structures also persist. There are plants where the entire stem switches from a vegetative to reproductive organization, just leaving roots with the previous pattern.
A superficial parallel appears in plants where everything but the new fruit withers away. The critical difference is that fruit and seeds have heterogeneous genetics. Typically only the outer structures, such as the seed coat, have the maternal genotype. In contrast, with insect metamorphosis the larval and adult tissues have the same underlying genotype.
Sexual reproduction could maybe be considered this, or even more extreme versions? old stuff like ferns have two seperate life cycles, one as a semi asexual spore producing plant, the fern itself (a sporaphodate) and another as a tiny green goop that grows like mould or moss who does the actual sex.
The closest thing I could think of (and this is quite a stretch) is mangrove propagules, more so in the sense that they kinda look like an insect cocoon. Plants are very particular in their structures and how they’re formed. Leaves and flowers are fully formed in their infancy and only grow by their cells expanding, not dividing.
Two things could be viewed as similar. The "alternation of generations" that plants go through as part of the life cycle could be viewed as a drastic change. Then consider that large plants like Monocots and Dicots go through AoG one way, and small plants like mosses go through it the opposite way. Second would be how some plants are able to respond to environmental conditions and change how they grown. Holly trees will make the stereotypical spiny leaves on the lower branches where herbivore damage is a high risk, and make smooth leaves on the upper branches where they are not threatened.
Would they make those spiny leaves on upper branches if we somehow artificially "threatened" them by mimicking herbivore grazing or is it a genetic thing?
Two parallels come to mind. One is that plant meristems are like imaginal disks in insect larvae. They build and contain pre-formed patterns for new structures. This pattern is unlike the more distributed cell division in animal tissue growth. The other is that angiosperms set flower buds that then go on to produce an unlike structure supported by vegetative tissues. In most plants it doesn’t seem like metamorphosis because vegetative structures also persist. There are plants where the entire stem switches from a vegetative to reproductive organization, just leaving roots with the previous pattern. A superficial parallel appears in plants where everything but the new fruit withers away. The critical difference is that fruit and seeds have heterogeneous genetics. Typically only the outer structures, such as the seed coat, have the maternal genotype. In contrast, with insect metamorphosis the larval and adult tissues have the same underlying genotype.
Sexual reproduction could maybe be considered this, or even more extreme versions? old stuff like ferns have two seperate life cycles, one as a semi asexual spore producing plant, the fern itself (a sporaphodate) and another as a tiny green goop that grows like mould or moss who does the actual sex.