Ghosts and avocados

As naturalist Connie Barlow writes in her book The Ghosts of Evolution (New York: Basic Books, 2000), certain species of plant - such as the humble but delicious avocado - have been discovered to be anachronisms, adapted to thrive in the symbiotic presence of another species that has since vanished from the earth. The avocado, with its rich flesh and gigantic seeds, is haunted by the ghosts of the giant sloth, gomphothere, and toxodon: Pleistocene mega fauna capable of swallowing the fruit whole and dispersing the pits. In the absence of such creatures, the future of the wild avocado is uncertain - it has lost its context, and must either evolve, find new partners, or perish.

Via the valedictory issue 18 (December2004) of HorizonZero, a Canadian newmedia magazine.

Gomphothere  - giant extinct elephants, like Platybelodon and Amebelodon.

Think of them, these extinct creatures, when next you eat an avocado...