Crazy Cucumber – Plant That Explodes When Touched

Apart from humans and animals, nature is abundant with crazy plants, believe it or not. One of those crazy plants is Ecbalium elaterim. This plant is also called crazy or exploding cucumber and it belongs to the family of Cucurbitaceae. It is a cousin to the cucumber and it is native to Europe, Northern Africa and some areas in Asia.

That is a small plant (30 centimeters high) with fruits that look like small cucumbers. When they’re ripe the fruits have very large pressure (6 atmosphere). Then, they are very sensitive and every small touch makes them squirting with liquid and seeds that fly 12 meters away.

These fruits are poisonous because they contain alkaloid called cucurbitacins. Because of that, their leaves are used to make some drugs.

The plant is used for treatments of heart disease, rheumatism and paralysis.

If you think about it, that is a perfect mechanism for discharging their seed. So if you see this interesting plant don’t touch them because it can scare you with an explosion of water and seeds.