Monoecious Plant

What Does Monoecious Plant Mean?

A monoecious plant is a plant where both the male and female reproductive systems exist on the same plant. Monoecious plants possess some flowers that are female and others that are male. Species that are able to pollinate themselves are considered self-pollinating.

Maximum Yield Explains Monoecious Plant

Corn is an excellent example of a monoecious plant. The developing ear of corn is the female reproductive portion and the tassel is the male. The female portion or ear contains the pistil and stamen for the plant, and the tassel or male portion contains the pollen, which at the proper time will fall onto the silk to pollinate the corn.

In corn the male portion or tassel may be removed and the ear or female portion of the plant may be artificially pollinated by hand for the creation of an entirely new variety. Such cross-pollination is common in modern plant science.

One drawback to self-pollinating monoecious plants is the danger of cross-pollination, which occurs when the pollen of the same species but from a different variety falls onto the female stamen of a different variety of the same species.

This can be a concern, because exactly what the resulting hybrid may be is often unpredictable.

Some monoecious plants are self-sterile, which means they require the pollen of another plant in order to pollinate.