Truth Theory: European scientists have now discovered that much like a lot of sentient life on the planet, trees need to get some sleep at night too. Reported in New Scientist by Andy Coghlan, while trees don’t exactly ‘sleep’ the way we do, they certainly do go into a period of rest. A team of researchers observed a birch tree in Finland and one in Austria one night, with the help of a terrestrial laser scanner. The former underwent a scan every hour and the latter once every ten minutes. They also picked a windless night to make sure that the scanner wouldn’t just pick up movement due to the wind and the discovery they made was astonishing.
In their official statement to the press, the team explained that the branches and leaves started drooping/relaxing as the night wore on. They were four inches lower than usual a couple of hours before the sun was set to rise. As the light grew stronger, they once again raised themselves to their full height.