Wild tobacco growing in the Sierra Madre Mountains of Santa Barbara County. (Fall 2024)
If we define intelligence as an ability to perceive, understand and respond effectively to environmental stimuli, then we might attribute to plants what is normally considered characteristic only of humans, and to a lesser extent members of the animal kingdom.
When a person gets bit by a blood-sucking parasitic insect, like a mosquito or a tick, they respond with defensive force to pluck it from their skin, shoo it away or crush it.
A young inexperienced and unlearned child might allow a mosquito to land on their arm and observe the pest as it taps her skin to feed.
Yet it’s not long before the feel of discomfort signals a problem and the child responds accordingly. The child may flinch or cry out or smack the insect dead.
It takes little experience in life to learn that these organisms represent a threat and to learn to identify them on sight and act preemptively.
A person may also learn about a pest from other knowledgeable people without first seeing one for themselves.
Hornworm, Manduca sexta, feeding on an unknown plant in the Santa Ynez Mountains of Santa Barbara County. (Spring 2025)
There exists many different sorts of human intelligence.
Among them are two broad categories proposed, in 1943, by psychologist Raymond Cattell. Building on the work of others, he defined two strains; fluid and crystallized.
National Library Of Medicine: Hebb and Cattell: The Genesis of the Theory of Fluid and Crystallized Intelligence
Fluid intelligence is an ability to reason and problem solve in the moment without use of previously acquired specialized knowledge.
Crystalized intelligence describes the portfolio of knowledge and skills gained through primary sensory experience.
But what strain of knowledge comes innate, held in seed, and activated at germination?
Crazy Larry
Coyote tobacco is smart enough, if we allow use of such a word primarily reserved for higher life forms, to recognize when it’s being attacked by an herbaceous predator.
Furthermore, the plant can distinguish between different sorts of leaf eating predators feeding on its body and respond in different ways.
Wild tobacco can increase biosynthesis of nicotine, a neurotoxin, in its roots and flush the poison into stems and leaves, to rid itself of the predator.
Tobacco can also emit volatile organic compounds into the air, which can attract natural predators of the insect or worm eating its leaves, thereby calling beneficial insect allies to its own defense.
These defense mechanisms may greatly retard predator attack in both a “bottom up” and “top down” manner, by altering both insect egg laying behavior and consumption rates.
“As a consequence, a plant could reduce the number of herbivores by more than 90% by releasing volatiles,” scientists have found.
American Association for the Advancement of Science: Defensive Function of Herbivore-Induced Plant Volatile Emissions in Nature
Moreover, nearby tobacco plants in the neighborhood may also detect these volatile organic compounds wafting in the air and recognize them as signaling an imminent threat.
Nearby plants may then increase their own levels of nicotine poison to combat insect attack.
“Studies have shown that the chemical signals resulting from injury are directly proportional to the extent of damage the plant has sustained,” scientists have found.
Science Direct: Plant Chemical Defenses Against Insect Herbivores—Using Wild Tobacco as a Model
A chanterelle showing its defining feature of decurrent plicated ridges, which sets it apart from other similar looking, inedible and poisonous gilled mushrooms.
Coyote tobacco is not alone in its ability to communicate with other plants and organisms.
In a previous post here six years ago, we discussed how oak trees communicate through subterranean fungal networks established by symbiotic fungus, like the sort that fruits chanterelle mushrooms.
Trees communicate through these fungal networks using chemical signals as well as electrical impulses.
These impulses can travel a third of an inch per second to notify neighboring trees about potential threats like insects or relate information about drought.
In the case of an insect attack, each oak tree connected to the network receives news of an imminent threat from trees already being eaten by bugs, and each tree then responds to the message defensively by boosting their output of toxic and bitter tasting tannins into their bark and leaves.
—The Mighty Chanterelle and the Gnarly Oak
(As sourced: Peter Wohlleben, The Hidden Life Of Trees)
Is this not some form of intelligence?
That’s one wily plant!
I think I’ve met some humans in the course of life that exhibit less consciousness and intelligence than plants like these.