Quote:
Originally Posted by Fledchen
My friend and I are trying to remember the title of a science fiction story in which an animal had evolved a symbiotic relationship with a plant with round seeds, using the seeds as a kind of crude wheel.
Anyone know what it was?
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Probably 'The Amber Spyglass' by Philip Pullman.
Mentioned in the "Wheeled" section of the Wikipedia article on "
Rotating locomotion in living systems".
"The 2000 novel The Amber Spyglass, by English author Philip Pullman, features an alien race known as the Mulefa, who use large, disc-shaped seed pods as wheels. They grip the pods with two limbs, while propelling themselves with two other limbs. The Mulefa have a symbiotic relationship with the seed pod trees, which depend on the rolling action to crack open the pods and allow the seeds to emerge."