Plants live in a world where every moment invites a new challenge and every challenge shapes the way
they grow, behave and survive. Unlike animals, they cannot migrate to safer locations when conditions
become harsh. They cannot search for better climates or escape from predators or move away from poor
soils. The place in which a plant germinates becomes the place where it must spend its entire life and
this immobility makes adaptation more than a biological feature. It becomes a continuous negotiation
with the environment that surrounds the plant. When we speak of ecological adaptations, we speak of
these subtle and complex adjustments that enable a plant to endure stress, use resources carefully and
maintain life in conditions that may change without warning. Adaptation allows a plant to persist in
deserts where water disappears faster than it arrives, in mountains where temperatures fluctuate sharply,
in saline soils that challenge nutrient uptake, in waterlogged areas where roots struggle for air and in
nutrient-poor soils where growth depends on efficiency more than abundance.