Like all plants, the tumbleweed does not really have a destination to go to. But there is a reason for its seemingly constant traveling.
Other than to be seen in a
Western movie, these plants have the universal goal of spreading their seeds.
Once its seeds are ripe, a layer of cells
in the stem of the plant weaken, and it breaks cleanly away. At this
stage, the
tumbleweed is almost a
perfect ball with about 250,000 seeds
stored inside. The wind then takes control of the weed. The ball is
designed so that when the plant hits the ground as it tumbles along, it
bounces and it won’t lose all of its valuable seeds in just a single
bounce.
Eventually something will stop the
tumbleweed.... Like a fence, or a shrub, or an old
trailer.
Like all plants the
weeds will eventually break up and rot away.
But tumbleweeds never really die...they just fade away.