Scientists Solve Mystery of World-Traveling Plant

sciencehabit writes "By land or by sea? That's the question scientists have been pondering for decades when it comes to the bottle gourd, a plant with a hard-skinned fruit that's used by cultures all over the world to make lightweight containers and other tools. Archaeologists know that people were using domesticated bottle gourds in the Americas as early as 10,000 years ago. But how did the plant make the jump from its original home in Africa to the New World with an ocean in the way? A new study overturns previous evidence pointing to a human-assisted land migration and concludes that the bottle gourd floated across the Atlantic Ocean to the Americas on its own."

Comments

Incomplete research perhaps?

[LynnwoodRooster]

Did they really investigate the theory that it was carried by a swallow?

Re:Incomplete research perhaps?

[Lehk228]

african or european swallow?

Message in a Bottle Gourd

[Anonymous Coward]

Walked out this morning. Don't believe what I saw. A hundred billion gourds washed up on the shore. Sending out their DNA.

Tsunami

[retroworks]

How often do tsunamis happen, and how big do they get? Japanese gourds wound up all over the North American Pacific beaches. http://www.npr.org/2013/02/06/...