the daughter fronds are produced by budding within
a single pouch of the mother frond. Several generations of fronds and their initials exist in union with
the parent frond at a given time. Most strikingly, almost all the fronds flower, both in nature and under
controlled culture conditions. Thus, in contrast to all other duckweed species, generative propagation is
as important as vegetative propagation, which opens the opportunity for artificial breeding. Moreover,
flower development on both mother and daughter fronds was observed at the same time. In contrast to
all other duckweed species, fronds of W. microscopica often possess a ventral projection of varying length
ranging from an almost flat appearance of the ventral surface to a length of 4 mm. Absence of root cap,
root hairs and vascular tissue demonstrate that this ventral protrusion is not a root and accordingly we
name this special structure “pseudoroot”. The high number of chloroplasts in the pseudoroot may result
in higher capacity of photosynthesis without increasing the frond area which covers the water surface.
Thus we propose that the pseudoroot serves to be advantageous to W. microscopica in multiplying at a
faster rate in comparison to other duckweeds.