Plant · P-681

Rice

Oryza sativa

Rice is a fast-growing annual grass grown standing in flooded or saturated ground for most of its cycle, harvested for a grain eaten boiled or steamed, popped, or pressed for oil. Everything left over pulls its own weight: the straw goes to weaving, paper, construction and fuel, and the hull and bran skimmed off in milling become livestock feed in their own right. It exists only in cultivation - no wild population is known - and no amount of good soil or warm temperature can substitute for the season-long flooding it needs.