Why do roses and their delectable cousins, raspberries and blackberries, have thorns?

Question

Could it be to enable them to cling to vertical surfaces and climb? In that case, why don't they have tendrils, as creepers and vines do?

Answer 1

They thorns evolved because they protect the stems and body of the plant from being eaten. But when an animal eats the fruit, they go and poop the seeds out - already fertilized! - somewhere else, which spreads the plant.

So: eating the stem, bad (kills the plant).
Eating the fruit, good.

Answer 2

For the same reason that skunks smell, turtles have a shell, possoms play dead and humans have a big brain, so they can protect themselves and their ability to re-produce. Birds and animals cannot get to the fruit, which carries the seeds, if there are thorns in the way. Many plants have different ways of protecting their seed, an apple for example has a thick layer of flesh around it, it is tasty to us, but it also keep the seeds nice and safe until the flesh either rots off or is eaten. Same concept for thorny plants, just a little less subtle.. and painful!

Answer 3

The thorns are there to tear up any would be harvesters of said berries. Then (most people don't know this) the berries release their seeds and take root in the exposed inner flesh, where they grow into new bushes. After the initial germination they harmlessly release their host and take root where they land. Some experts beleive that after the separation, there is still some sort of bond between the plant and the animal and if one perishes, then they both perrish. Or I could be wrong. About everything.

Answer 4

Raspberries come either with thorns or without. When looking through catalogs, the thornless ones are clearly labelled. If not, that means they have thorns. I am not sure about thornless blackberries.

Answer 5

The thorns are to protect their yummy edible parts from animals. A bunny won't eat at a plant a second time if he gets cut the first time. The thorns protect the berries and blossoms on the berry bushes and protect the delicious rose hips on the rose bushes.

Answer 6

To protect themselves from being eaten by creatures who might see them as a desert.

Answer 7

To protect them from birds

Answer 8

So they might attach themselves to roaming animals and propagate.

Here we go...Someone brings a god into the equation.

Answer 9

It is a defense mechanism to keep other people and animals from killing them.

Answer 10

it's just the way things are. God created them like that. By the way they definitely couldn't cling to stuff and climb because they are inanimate objects.